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发帖数: 28 | 1 http://articles.philly.com/2014-07-30/news/52192626_1_temple-un
"We cannot ignore the mounting evidence that standardized test scores inject
socio-economic bias into the admissions and financial-aid equations," said
Hai-Lung Dai, Temple's provost and senior vice president for academic
affairs.
In an effort to cultivate talented students who don't test well, Temple
University says it will become the first national public research university
in the Northeast to make standardized test scores optional for admission.
The university expects as many as 150 to 200 students who likely would not
have been accepted because of low SAT and ACT scores, but who exhibit other
promising attributes, will be admitted for fall 2015. Many of them could
come from the Philadelphia School District.
Students who opt not to submit test scores will have to answer written
questions designed to assess attributes such as leadership, self-awareness,
goal-setting, determination, and "grit," Temple officials said.
For years, critics have called the SAT an unreliable predictor of college
readiness that discriminates against minority students and those from low-
income families.
"We cannot ignore the mounting evidence that standardized test scores inject
socio-economic bias into the admissions and financial-aid equations," said
Hai-Lung Dai, Temple's provost and senior vice president for academic
affairs.
Temple becomes the second Philadelphia-area college in the last week to
announce a test-optional policy, as more universities are looking for ways
to make college accessible to students who are the first in their families
to attend or come from low-income families and minority groups.
Bryn Mawr, a private women's college on the Main Line, said last week that
it would make the test optional. St. Joseph's University made the same move
last year. Nationally, more than 800 colleges - about 30 percent of schools
that grant bachelor's degrees - give students the option of whether to
submit SAT and ACT scores.
But at Temple, which is in the heart of North Philadelphia, home to a school
district in which most students are minority and live in poverty, the
decision indicates a broader commitment.
"I'm excited that Temple is taking this on," said William R. Hite Jr.,
superintendent of the Philadelphia School District. "We have children who
may not do well [on standardized tests], but these children may have
designed, planned, developed, and built a hybrid car.
"No one can convince me that the skills and abilities of those children are
any less than those who may have had SAT and ACT prep courses" - something
many district students cannot afford.
Hite was referring to students at the district's Workshop School, which
teaches students to learn through hands-on projects such as building hybrid
cars.
Temple officials said they would also work to monitor and nurture through
graduation the students who are admitted without SATs, using a $225,000
grant from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
"Temple is an access-oriented institution and it's making a major effort to
serve more students," said Bob Schaeffer, public education director of Fair
Test: National Center for Fair and Open Testing, a critic of the SAT and
other standardized tests.
Over the last two decades, Temple has become increasingly competitive. The
average combined reading and math SAT score for last year's freshman class
was 1129 out of a possible 1600 - 19 points higher than the previous year.
That's a marked shift from the mid-1990s, when the average score was in the
980s.
The university has faced criticism as abandoning its commitment to the city
and accepting more students from the suburbs who are increasingly white and
wealthy.
Many students from Philadelphia's neighborhood high schools are finishing at
the top of their class, but have SAT scores in the 800s, putting them at a
disadvantage.
"Students were getting discouraged. They were feeling that they didn't have
an opportunity to go to Temple," said Gregory Anderson, who became dean of
the College of Education a year ago, and served on the committee that made
the decision to abandon the SAT requirement. "There's the belief that there'
s no point in even applying."
Anderson, who is black and whose parents are from South Africa, was first in
his family to go to college and struggled with standardized tests.
"I know firsthand how important this is," he said.
The Temple committee that proposed eliminating the SAT requirement
emphasized that the university wants to admit only students who have the
ability to do well.
"The whole strategy is based on finding students who will succeed but are
being disadvantaged because of the test score," said William N. Black,
Temple's senior vice provost for enrollment management. "It's that potential
we want to develop."
This year, a study released by the National Association of College Admission
Counseling found almost no difference in college GPAs and graduation rates
between students who submitted SAT scores and those who did not at colleges
where scores are optional.
Temple, which began considering the change nearly a year ago, reviewed
experiences at other schools, such as DePaul University in Chicago, which
made standardized tests optional in 2011.
The nation's largest Catholic university, DePaul has found that students
admitted without ACT scores have performed almost as well as the others.
There was only a 0.07 percent difference in GPAs, and nearly the same
percentage came back for a second year, said Jon Boeckenstedt, associate
vice president for enrollment management and marketing.
That's despite the fact that the two groups of students came in with widely
different ACT scores. The group whose scores were not used for admission had
scored at about the 49th percentile nationally, compared to the 83d
percentile for the others, Boeckenstedt said.
"We don't believe that proves our argument," he said. "Our research is
ongoing. But at this point, we don't have anything that causes us to be
concerned."
DePaul requires students who do not submit standardized test scores to
answer four essay questions, designed to assess their ability to persist and
graduate, Boeckenstedt said. The questions address goal-setting, personal
challenges, leadership, and extracurriculars. Temple is still developing its
questions, Black said.
Black said he expects about 10 percent of applicants to forgo test scores in
the first year, based on experience at other universities. Temple received
27,521 applications last year and will enroll 4,500 freshmen this fall.
Athletes, homeschoolers, and international students not enrolled in a U.S.
high school for at least three years still will be required to submit test
scores, the university said.
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215-854-4693 @ssnyderinq
www.inquirer.com/campusinq
Here are other colleges in the area that have a test-optional policy:
Philadelphia
St. Joseph’s University
Peirce College
The Hussian School of Art
The Art Institute of Philadelphia
Other Schools in the Area
Susquehanna University in Selinsgrove, Pa.
Dickinson College in Carlisle, Pa.
Franklin and Marshall College in Lancaster
Ursinus College in Collegeville
Gettysburg College
Albright College in Reading
Gratz College in Melrose Park
Muhlenberg College in Allentown and the College of New Jersey in Ewing
require scores for some programs.
Source: National Center for Fair and Open Testing | l****y
发帖数: 4773 | 2 talented students who don't test well
就看了这一句就不用往下看了。祝米国talented student取之不尽 | x******g
发帖数: 33885 | |
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