>Research has shown — and lawsuits have argued — that the tests, long used to measure aptitude for college, are far more connected to family income and don't provide meaningful information about a student's ability to succeed in college.
What's linked is an article (another from NPR) quoting a college official as claiming that, which, it's true, isn't research. However, the linked article itself links to the particular piece of research that both articles are referring to, which contains:
"Furthermore, our data indicated that high school GPA had a stronger correlation with college success for Non- Submitters than the ACT/SAT (for the 27% of Non-Submitters for whom we had test scores) -- both in terms of college cumulative GPA and graduation rate. While test scores had a generally stronger relationship with college GPAs for the Submitters, for the Non-Submitters they tended to show a weaker relationship, essentially under- predicting the college GPA. The test scores continued to most strongly correlate with family income."
So they may be right or may be wrong, and the research may be good or it may be crap, but NPR does not appear to be misrepresenting its own sources.
They show both correlation with income, and success in college.
The correlation with income and test results is quite possibly conflated with preparedness, since money provides more opportunities to succeed in school.
Still isn't that the same thing? Folks who didn't have pre-college study opportunities might test less well. It doesn't mean they can't succeed in college. That's the point I think; we have to stop weighing environmental factors so highly, since they skew admissions toward wealthy applicants. Which is widely perceived as unfair.
The linked research does not provide evidence of the latter (i.e., that SAT score does not provide meaningful information about a student's ability to succeed in college), but it DOES provide evidence of the former (that the tests very much measure family income).
It is quite possible, of course, and even quite likely, that higher income families will do better in college (since that likely means better education throughout childhood, as well as less likely to need a job or take on debt to attend, so less distraction, and in the event of struggle more ability to hire tutors and things), but the point is that to admit that "we're selecting for rich people" is to say the quiet part out loud; and colleges of course don't want to do that.
Is any remotely "fair" public college admissions system even possible? Race-based quotas are discriminatory. SAT scores are discriminatory. Legacy admissions are discriminatory. Extracurriculars are discriminatory. Judging based on school/school district performance is discriminatory. I say just start picking names out of a hat and be done with it.
Selecting twice as many candidates as you need and then choosing half of them randomly might actually be a good idea, just so everyone knows that you're there in part because you got lucky.
(Also, tracking what happens to each group might result in some interesting data.)
Yes, the system that gives my kid the best shot of getting admitted. /s
Rich families want legacy admissions.
Asian prefer grades and tests because they generally excel in those areas.
Under-represented groups want to do away with both because neither legacy or tests benefits them.
Here in France, elite STEM schools run a series of highly competitive exams that consist of a series of written tests and oral interviews over several weeks. These are brutal, students basically prepare for them for 2 to 3 years and there is no alternate way to trick your way in. Not if you're a billionaire.
The system is far from perfect: only a teeny tiny fraction of students who make it are from poor/underprivileged backgrounds (some do). Yes it is infinitely easier to prepare for these exams in a middle class family than in a ghetto.
Yet it still seems an order of magnitude MORE FAIR then checking whether daddy is a big donor to the school. Or having SATs that are so ridiculously easy that we're gonna have to fallback on whether you were a member of the theater club.
I think that's half of the system that Colorado is opposing? Test scores (not so easy) reflect income more than aptitude. Not just the 'legacy' checkbox.
You are talking about admissions for highly specialized schools, which exists in America as well. This article is concerning regular public universities.
"The governor also signed a bill that removes a requirement that public colleges consider SAT or ACT scores for freshmen, though the new law still allows students to submit test scores if they wish."
That doesn't seem equitable at all, it seems to encourage admission based on social status and parent's wealth.
Yes, that's the plan. Ever notice that it's always upper middle class people bitching about the SAT's? That's because they're too poor for legacy / donor advantage, and they can't stand that poor people would have a fair shot through a standardized test.
Yep. It enables discrimination because it enables college admissions to become almost entirely subjective. It's a way to get attaboys for banning legacies while simultaneously opening a back door to let them in without scrutiny. And that's not even mentioning all the other ways college admissions might discriminate against deserving candidates.
Why does it encourage that? What incentive does admissions have to admit students with wealthy parents? To me it seems like it gives admissions an excuse to admit anyone they want even if they have super low test scores as long as it is in the name of inclusivity and diversity.
It's about reducing the number of Asian Americans in admissions, who vastly outperform other groups on the SAT(1). Ivy leagues like Harvard have been discriminating against Asians for years with affirmative action and bullshit like "personality score"(2). This is yet another anti-Asian, anti-merit move by ideologues who want an "equitable" pie chart of skin colors for their Powerpoint presentations.
Same. Doesn’t really make sense when the arguments for private college legacy admissions center around endowments. Public colleges don’t have endowments as far as I know.
Good. Although this law doesn't cover private universities, in my opinion universities that practice legacy admissions should not be eligible to receive federal funding. If universities get tax payer money, they shouldn't then get to give away spots to wealthy people. I'm sure Harvard, Stanford, Yale, and all the schools that practice legacy admissions would hate it. I think they will manage to adjust.
The comments here are strange to me, as a non-American. "Without SATs the rich will just pay their way in!!"
Are there not other ways of evaluating a students aptitude? Like... their grades?
In my country, we do not have standardized testing. We have world renowned universities. Students are evaluated by their grades, often an application essay, and possibly any extracurricular or volunteer work (but I know of no anecdotal evidence of this making any difference).
Here, wealthy students usually pay full tuition (usually under 10k USD a semester) and the less fortunate get heavy subsidies. My partner's parents had low income, and combined with bursaries and grants, she paid next to nothing.
Curriculum difficulty varies WIDELY among US High Schools - not just public/private, but based on state, locality, etc. It's heterogenous to the point that A-quality work in one school might get you a C in a school 20 miles away.
The traditional solution has been standardized tests (SAT, ACT, AP, IB are all fairly common nationally, PLUS most states have their own tests by subject). The qualms people have is that, short of these tests, universities are forced to make subjective judgements about high school quality, extracurriculars, etc that are often skewed rich.
The Meritocracy Trap by Daniel Markovits is a great book on this topic.
It makes a great argument that, unfortunately, merit based admission to elite universities does nothing to increase equality of opportunity because the rich are so much better at training and educating their children.
The upside is that people are forced to earn their privilege with hard work and study, rather than having it handed to them at birth. The downside is that there’s no light at the end of the tunnel, privilege begets more work, which begets more material wealth, which begets yet harder work / overachieving children.
Are legacy admissions at public colleges a common thing? This is the first I've ever heard about the concept as I, perhaps naively on my part, assumed they operated formulaically as faceless bureaucracies. Input the usual suspects of grades and SAT scores, perhaps fudge it a bit with income and race, and pop out a score to sort the applicants.
>Research has shown — and lawsuits have argued — that the tests, long used to measure aptitude for college, are far more connected to family income and don't provide meaningful information about a student's ability to succeed in college.
Has anyone looked at whether family income is a good indicator of whether students get through college? I would bet it is.
Considering how it's quite literally impossible to get through college today without external financial support anyways, I would be pretty surprised if there wasn't a correlation.
That would be highly politically incorrect research. Meaning there would not be any. Which allows for formally correct statements like "there is no research indicating..." and your bet is categorized as unscientific.
I can't exactly speak to legacy admissions, but I went to the same public US university as my dad, and because of that I got my out-of-state tuition fee ($8000 a semester) waived entirely. Even though we are solidly middle-class financially, because my dad couldn't find steady work after the 2008 recession, we kids were on our own for college (that is, I paid/am paying all my own bills & student loans). This waiver is what made his alma mater an option for me financially, and while I certainly could have gone somewhere cheaper & closer to home to make it easier on my checkbook, I don't regret my choice at all and I'm happy I get to share that connection with my dad (and now also my sister!). It was an awesome place to be, and being so far from home all the time means I learned some really important lessons, so I definitely don't take it for granted.
I think it's also worth mentioning that we both exceeded the minimum requirement for automatic admission, so the fact that we were legacy students didn't really mean anything in that regard, but now I wonder what it would have been like if we didn't meet that criteria - knowing this university, sadly it is almost definitely something that influences their decision, despite their large size. I don't know that I want them to do away with legacy benefits entirely, as by proxy it's a huge reason for who I am now, but I am 100% behind the idea to do away with using them in admissions settings, I really don't think that's fair. Truthfully, me still getting hefty kickback from it isn't really all too fair, and while getting residency in this state is not difficult, that's not the same either. It's tough to balance my appreciation for what the program does enable, and my distaste for the way it excludes many equally if not more deserving people.
I’m going to guess wealthy donors will just look to private Universities now. Should be interesting to see how fund raising works out for them in the future.
Research universities rely on many sources of income, not the least of which are government grants and non-donor funding as well as, you know, tuition and fees.
It's not like lack of legacy admissions support is cutting them off at the knees.
Yow, the real core of the article is about the SAT/ACT.
I'm glad that they're ditching them, because of how much I hate the College Board, and those exams.
But as a matter of principle, college admissions must be on merit. It's easy to say it shouldn't be based on family ties... But what will replace exam scores?
I don't like this discussion on "equity", because it seems that the inevitable conclusion is that race will become a metric in deciding college admission.
> I don't like this discussion on "equity", because it seems that the inevitable conclusion is that race will become a metric in deciding college admission.
This is exactly what some people want. Instead of a meritocracy and an individualist society where we judge each person by their individual merits, we're trending toward a society where we only see and treat a person by the categories they fall into.
Race is already a metric in deciding college admission. Asian Americans need significantly higher GPAs to get into pretty much any competitive program.
My impression was that the Colorado public universities weren't that competitive. Now, that impression was formed almost fifty years ago, so it could well be wrong. But I wonder whether Governor Polis isn't addressing a non-existent problem.
This is just creating a more unjust system, under the guise of fighting oppression. A metric based on individual effort and merit, can be done away with for political reasons, and rewarding ideological affiliation.
Under communism, it was notorious that those that were connected to the party had preferred access to university even with terrible grades.
Who wants to go to a doctor that got a degree because Daddy's ideological loyalty.
[+] [-] nazgulnarsil|4 years ago|reply
The linked research shows nothing of the sort.
[+] [-] handrous|4 years ago|reply
"Furthermore, our data indicated that high school GPA had a stronger correlation with college success for Non- Submitters than the ACT/SAT (for the 27% of Non-Submitters for whom we had test scores) -- both in terms of college cumulative GPA and graduation rate. While test scores had a generally stronger relationship with college GPAs for the Submitters, for the Non-Submitters they tended to show a weaker relationship, essentially under- predicting the college GPA. The test scores continued to most strongly correlate with family income."
So they may be right or may be wrong, and the research may be good or it may be crap, but NPR does not appear to be misrepresenting its own sources.
[+] [-] JoeAltmaier|4 years ago|reply
The correlation with income and test results is quite possibly conflated with preparedness, since money provides more opportunities to succeed in school.
Still isn't that the same thing? Folks who didn't have pre-college study opportunities might test less well. It doesn't mean they can't succeed in college. That's the point I think; we have to stop weighing environmental factors so highly, since they skew admissions toward wealthy applicants. Which is widely perceived as unfair.
[+] [-] lostcolony|4 years ago|reply
It is quite possible, of course, and even quite likely, that higher income families will do better in college (since that likely means better education throughout childhood, as well as less likely to need a job or take on debt to attend, so less distraction, and in the event of struggle more ability to hire tutors and things), but the point is that to admit that "we're selecting for rich people" is to say the quiet part out loud; and colleges of course don't want to do that.
[+] [-] blululu|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|4 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] HideousKojima|4 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] throwaway8581|4 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] paxys|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] skybrian|4 years ago|reply
(Also, tracking what happens to each group might result in some interesting data.)
[+] [-] delaynomore|4 years ago|reply
Rich families want legacy admissions. Asian prefer grades and tests because they generally excel in those areas. Under-represented groups want to do away with both because neither legacy or tests benefits them.
[+] [-] ianhawes|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tolbish|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] zulu314|4 years ago|reply
The system is far from perfect: only a teeny tiny fraction of students who make it are from poor/underprivileged backgrounds (some do). Yes it is infinitely easier to prepare for these exams in a middle class family than in a ghetto.
Yet it still seems an order of magnitude MORE FAIR then checking whether daddy is a big donor to the school. Or having SATs that are so ridiculously easy that we're gonna have to fallback on whether you were a member of the theater club.
[+] [-] JoeAltmaier|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] paxys|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tschellenbach|4 years ago|reply
That doesn't seem equitable at all, it seems to encourage admission based on social status and parent's wealth.
[+] [-] fallingknife|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] trentnix|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|4 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] umvi|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] throwkeep|4 years ago|reply
1. https://www.brookings.edu/research/race-gaps-in-sat-scores-h...
2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Students_for_Fair_Admissions_v...
[+] [-] skrtskrt|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] wyager|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] fotta|4 years ago|reply
For public colleges only. I'm actually quite surprised it existed for public institutions in the first place.
[+] [-] TechBro8615|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rejectedandsad|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] MyHypatia|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] xyzzy_plugh|4 years ago|reply
Are there not other ways of evaluating a students aptitude? Like... their grades?
In my country, we do not have standardized testing. We have world renowned universities. Students are evaluated by their grades, often an application essay, and possibly any extracurricular or volunteer work (but I know of no anecdotal evidence of this making any difference).
Here, wealthy students usually pay full tuition (usually under 10k USD a semester) and the less fortunate get heavy subsidies. My partner's parents had low income, and combined with bursaries and grants, she paid next to nothing.
[+] [-] curiousllama|4 years ago|reply
The traditional solution has been standardized tests (SAT, ACT, AP, IB are all fairly common nationally, PLUS most states have their own tests by subject). The qualms people have is that, short of these tests, universities are forced to make subjective judgements about high school quality, extracurriculars, etc that are often skewed rich.
[+] [-] sawyer|4 years ago|reply
It makes a great argument that, unfortunately, merit based admission to elite universities does nothing to increase equality of opportunity because the rich are so much better at training and educating their children.
The upside is that people are forced to earn their privilege with hard work and study, rather than having it handed to them at birth. The downside is that there’s no light at the end of the tunnel, privilege begets more work, which begets more material wealth, which begets yet harder work / overachieving children.
[+] [-] koolba|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] MattGaiser|4 years ago|reply
Has anyone looked at whether family income is a good indicator of whether students get through college? I would bet it is.
[+] [-] paxys|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Cd00d|4 years ago|reply
https://www.the74million.org/article/alarming-statistics-tel...
I used Google for that. search term: income and college graduation rates
[+] [-] Glavnokoman|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Voline|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] silicon2401|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|4 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] spacefiish|4 years ago|reply
I think it's also worth mentioning that we both exceeded the minimum requirement for automatic admission, so the fact that we were legacy students didn't really mean anything in that regard, but now I wonder what it would have been like if we didn't meet that criteria - knowing this university, sadly it is almost definitely something that influences their decision, despite their large size. I don't know that I want them to do away with legacy benefits entirely, as by proxy it's a huge reason for who I am now, but I am 100% behind the idea to do away with using them in admissions settings, I really don't think that's fair. Truthfully, me still getting hefty kickback from it isn't really all too fair, and while getting residency in this state is not difficult, that's not the same either. It's tough to balance my appreciation for what the program does enable, and my distaste for the way it excludes many equally if not more deserving people.
[+] [-] vondur|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] r00fus|4 years ago|reply
It's not like lack of legacy admissions support is cutting them off at the knees.
[+] [-] bjt2n3904|4 years ago|reply
I'm glad that they're ditching them, because of how much I hate the College Board, and those exams.
But as a matter of principle, college admissions must be on merit. It's easy to say it shouldn't be based on family ties... But what will replace exam scores?
I don't like this discussion on "equity", because it seems that the inevitable conclusion is that race will become a metric in deciding college admission.
[+] [-] silicon2401|4 years ago|reply
This is exactly what some people want. Instead of a meritocracy and an individualist society where we judge each person by their individual merits, we're trending toward a society where we only see and treat a person by the categories they fall into.
[+] [-] TheAdamAndChe|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] aejnsn|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] cafard|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] angryasian|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] vmception|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dukeofdoom|4 years ago|reply
Under communism, it was notorious that those that were connected to the party had preferred access to university even with terrible grades.
Who wants to go to a doctor that got a degree because Daddy's ideological loyalty.