In recent years, many institutions have foregone the practice of compulsory standardized test score reporting, including the University. Schools initially expressed concerns about reliable and equitable access to standardized testing in the face of a global pandemic. Now, many elite universities are reversing this practice, citing standardized testing such as the SAT and ACT as prescient predictors of college performance and a way to counterbalance grade inflation. This issue has even attracted attention from the executive branch, as it was one of the many commands issued in the Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education released in October.
Although higher education’s concerns about standardized testing were understandable given the conditions imposed by the COVID-19 pandemic, along with research outlining sources of inequity in standardized testing, new evidence, along with loosened COVID restrictions have given reason for reconsideration. An increase in access to both test-taking and preparation materials since the pandemic — along with existing methods to make scoring more equitable — should warrant a switch back to requiring students to report standardized test scores when applying to the University.
The pandemic is not the sole context regarding the discourse in favor of mandatory test reporting. One major argument against it is that standardized tests are socioeconomically biased, and that family income correlates with test scores. While this is true, it is important to note that most aspects of college admissions — and indeed life — are correlated with socioeconomic status. Lower socioeconomic status is strongly associated with poorer health, disproportionate incarceration statistics and a host of other negative outcomes. In other words, the application process begins favoring the socioeconomically advantaged well before a student sets foot in a testing room, meaning that removing the SAT is not a magic pill for equity in applications.
Moreover, if standardized testing is not an aspect of college admissions, then extra weight is now placed upon parts such as essays and extracurricular activities, where it is much easier for socioeconomically advantaged students to utilize their wealth to misrepresent their capabilities. Socioeconomically advantaged students tend to have increased extracurricular activities, a wider selection of AP and Dual Enrollment classes to choose from and a higher general quality of schooling. On the other hand, the SAT is available to all high school students and has a rather extensive fee waiver policy, in addition to being offered and there is a glut of free resources for preparation. Websites such as Khan Academy and College Board offer courses, in addition to the thousands of videos on websites like YouTube. In short, access to resources which prepare students for standardized testing is as accessible as it has ever been.
Furthermore, tests such as the SAT and ACT are aptitude tests, measuring a student’s ability to quickly answer a variety of similar questions. There are no questions on esoteric knowledge stored only in the halls of elite northeastern boarding schools — only algebra II and sophomore year grammar. While it is true that wealthier students will have access to higher-quality preparation materials, anyone who believes themselves to be bright enough to attend one of the top schools in the country should be capable of achieving a respectable score on such an exam, with or without spending hundreds or thousands of dollars on coaching.
Regardless of the extent to which there is increased accessibility to prepare for standardized testing, socioeconomic bias does remain a pervasive issue in the debate regarding requiring standardized test scores for admission into the University. Luckily, this bias can be accounted for, and it should be. Elite schools that have recently returned to a mandatory reporting system, such as Dartmouth College and Yale University, explicitly stated that they contextualize these reported scores, taking into account factors that are thought to influence scoring, such as socioeconomic status. This caveat makes a world of difference and ensures that the results of standardized testing are more equitable.
These schools provide a possible model through which the University can reintroduce mandatory score reporting in an equitable manner, allowing for an injection of objectivity into an increasingly holistic process. One possible method to contextualize results could be to compare them to other students in the applicant’s zip code and, using statistical analysis, assign a “weight” to that individual’s score. This sort of localization could help to ensure that admissions officers are comparing a student to their environment, a much more equitable method to measure a student’s capacity for success. This sort of data contextualization has proven to be a useful tool in highlighting overachieving students from disadvantaged backgrounds.
One would be remiss to discuss this topic at this school without bringing up the fact that mandatory test score reporting, along with public reporting of data for admitted and rejected students, is a key feature of the very first point of the aforementioned Compact. This mandate, in and of itself, is relatively benign. The request seems relatively clear cut. However, others in the Compact are not, instead forcing universities to cede leverage to the federal government without adequate clarity on what it wants would all but guarantee unwanted and unwarranted intervention in universities’ governance.
College admissions is a fraught and highly contested topic, occurring at the intersection of discussions about race, poverty and gender. However, a study from Dartmouth College found that the decision to go test-optional did not greatly increase the number of applicants from lower socioeconomic backgrounds — a direct contradiction of one of the main selling points of going test-optional. Access to higher education should be for every person, regardless of their background. In utilizing the metric of standardized testing, this objectivity works as a method of discernment for student performance prognostication when it comes to selective schools, especially when these scores are contextualized to account for the socioeconomic differences that may be inherent. The University should switch back to mandatory test score reporting, as it creates an accurate and objective measure of aptitude when properly contextualized.
Conall Castagno is an opinion columnist who writes about politics for The Cavalier Daily. He can be reached at opinion@cavalierdaily.com.
The opinions expressed in this column are not necessarily those of The Cavalier Daily. Columns represent the views of the author alone.
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