the ACT. the SAT. rubbish? worthy signal of ability? biased?

this here be the thread to debate such matters.

Probably rubbish, but I do pretty great on those kinda tests so I like 'em.

Not rubbish. They do exactly what they are designed to do. They only become rubbish if people try to make them mean more than they actually do mean.

Not rubbish at all. Unless all testing is rubbish. Unless feeling pressure in real life is rubbish.

What do you think, T?

Believe it or not, I've never thought about it, and don't have an opinion.

i'm of the opinion that they're a valuable piece of an overall puzzle. colleges probably place too much emphasis on the results of this one test, but it's not at all a worthless test or exercise in futility.

i also agree with LW that test taking and performing under pressure is an important skill, and that success on these evaluative measures say more about a student's preparation and soft skills than they do intellectual accumen.

I don't have any data, but isn't the need to do well on these standardized tests the result of a huge glut at the the high end. So many people score so high on these tests that worthy people who score slightly lower are edged out. Is this wrong?

are you asking if this is a bad policy? or if your analysis is mistaken?

If my analysis is wrong.

The tests are simple because you're trying to test basic skills in a population that comes into the test with widely variable levels of education already. It's only natural that a lot of people are going to get very high scores, isn't it? Making determinations among these people must have its flaws. It seems that designing the test poses quite a dilemma.

Still it seems that you need some way of judging basic skill levels. Are grades enough?

A standardized test is orders of magnitude better than using grades. The ability to get high grades can be largely dependent on the school. A standardized test is the same for everybody. Obviously, there are flaws, but you know someone who gets in the 30s on the ACT is an OK student.

THIS.

an A in the freshman algebra class i taught in north philly isn't the same thing as an A in the freshman algebra class at stuyvesant.

SATs are very important. They allowed me to float through high school in an alcoholic, drug fueled haze. Knowing I could rely on a very high SAT score in math to get me into whatever school I wanted. So I'll never have a bad word to say about the use of SATs.

Here's another question that you've raised. I was a TA in graduate school. I saw a lot of very bright students who weren't good students. I'm sure that they all had very high SAT scores. Should colleges admit students with very high SAT scores who were poor students in high school? What proof does the college have that a bright student with no history of committing to study would actually study once admitted? Is it better to accept a student with very good grades but slightly lower SAT scores, or a student with extremely high SAT scores and poor grades? How often are colleges actually faced with this kind of a decision?

I think most schools take a mix and rightly so. When you know you're going to go to university, high school's a joke. The classes aren't challenging and at points in time it more closely resembles daycare for teenagers than a place of learning.

Other than basic math and english skills, the most important skills I learned in high school all took place outside of classes. Networking, socializing, sex, group dynamics, negotiating skills.

Standardization ftw.

/thread

given2trade must have been absent that day.

I think SATs are very important. The high school I went to is nationally acclaimed. The top 3-5% is composed almost entirely of asian and indian students. I think 4 people in my graduating class of 600ish got a 1600. I imagine probably 20 or so got over 1550.

The thing is, grades show almost nothing. For one, you can have up to a 5.0 in high school based on how many honors classes you take. At a harder school like the one I went to, the people who get over a 4.0 are generally a lot different than the people who get over a 4.0 at a school in east Austin or downtown San Antonio.

Until they start requiring IQ tests, the SAT and ACT are the only actual measures of how intelligent someone is. Furthermore, the SAT measures exactly the kind of intelligence you need to do well in college, unlike the IQ test.

Based strictly on anecdotal evidence, I would say that the SAT is a very, very good indicator of ability and intelligence. My cousin got a 1590, went to Georgia Tech, and graduated at the top of her class with a double major in aeronautical engineering and computer science in 4 years. A girl I know who graduated high school in 2007 and got a 1600 is now majoring in astrophysics at Yale. The older sister of one of my good friends got a 1590 in 1999, went to Brandeis(sp?) and is now at Yale Law School.

So in my experience, the people who are scoring remarkably high on the SATs are indeed the people that deserve to be going to the best schools in the nation. And that's really all that matters. That the most qualified students get accepted to the best schools.

Yah, I never had sex with tyler. True story.

I coulda sworn it was your ass.

I'm a top, friend.