Re:MIT to no longer consider SAT subject tests in admissions...
by MichaelDickens on Friday March 20, 2020 @03:12PM
(#22640602)
GP comment seems completely relevant to SAT subject tests to me. The point is that removing a test from consideration, even if it's not the only test considered, makes it easier for rich people to game the application process.
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Re:MIT to no longer consider SAT subject tests in admissions...
by brlewis on Friday March 20, 2020 @03:27PM
(#22640740)
No. The point about replacing a test with more subjective criteria is completely invalidated when, instead, multiple tests are replaced with a single test.
EDIT: Instead of completely invalidated, I should say irrelevant to MIT's change. In another context it could be an important point.
Re:MIT to no longer consider SAT subject tests in admissions...
by strbean on Friday March 20, 2020 @04:54PM
(#22641561)
I think the top level comment is based on the assumption that a greater quantity of objective data will lead to a greater weighting of objective data, and a lower quantity will lead to a lower weighting, leading to a greater weighting of subjective measures.
Re:MIT to no longer consider SAT subject tests in admissions...
by jrumbut on Friday March 20, 2020 @05:22PM
(#22641791)
Likewise, there are many skills you can't demonstrate on the SAT such as Spanish language proficiency. For whatever reason I took the French subject test but no AP test, perhaps there are other schools that do this.
The math score might say a little about the other sciences, but the blmultilingual students are going to be disadvantaged by this it seems to me.
Re:MIT to no longer consider SAT subject tests in admissions...
by benchaney on Friday March 20, 2020 @06:04PM
(#22642119)
This is completely incorrect. The SAT is not changing to incorporate the skills that would have previously measured by the subject test. As a result we are simply going to have fewer objective metrics.
Re:MIT to no longer consider SAT subject tests in admissions...
by brlewis on Friday March 20, 2020 @07:57PM
(#22642978)
When I say "replacing" I mean in terms of the weight they carry in admissions.
Re:MIT to no longer consider SAT subject tests in admissions...
by knzhou on Friday March 20, 2020 @03:17PM
(#22640653)
Exactly. If you look at the comments on the linked article, or the ones that were on top here when I wrote mine, people are making comments that aren't specific to the SAT subject test at all -- "this is great, because I bombed that test", "this lowers stress", "that test was too easy anyway".
Re:MIT to no longer consider SAT subject tests in admissions...
by bobthepanda on Friday March 20, 2020 @07:45PM
(#22642898)
If the subject test was a thing that everyone was informed about, did not cost extra, and was readily available, if not required alongside standard SAT administration, then I would be more inclined to agree. But here knowing that they even exist is half the battle.