Grading the new SAT
John Harper of the Weekly Standard reviews the new SAT and is surprised - and impressed - by what he finds. I'm surprised - and impressed - by what I read.
Little things:
* Harper uses the word "psychometrician", which I'm very happy to see in print, because I'm tired of spelling and defining it for people I meet.
* Harper found a college admissions officer who was willing to be quoted by name in saying what all psychometricians and admissions officers know, which is that standardized test scores tell you much more about a potential applicant than class rank.
* Harper took the time to wade through UC President Richard Atkinson's original SAT criticisms, disregarding the rush to criticize the existence of the test (by liberals) and the rush to disparage any test critic (by conservatives), and pulled out the true gist of the criticisms. Harper also thinks that ETS addressed those criticisms in the smartest and fairest way possible.
* Harper flatly acknowleges that words like "IQ" and "aptitude" have become anathema to the PC crowd. Rare is the news article willing to admit this.
Big things:
* Harper points out that the current SAT is not racially biased, because the existence of a group mean difference does not prove bias, and the test does not negatively impact non-Asian racial minorities because it actually overpredicts, rather than underpredicts, their college performance. Psychometricians already know this, but the mainstream media steadfastly refuses to state it. If anything, Asians are negatively impacted by the current SAT, which underpredicts their college performance.
* If group mean differences don't change under the new SAT, which is more obviously not a racially-biased IQ test but a test of college preparedness, it will be even more damning evidence of the public school's inabilities to educate. My prediction is that this will lead to even more test criticisms, which is the easy way out, rather than an overhaul of the public education system.
Harper says, in conclusion:
Competition under the new SAT will be fairer, at least in that everyone will know that the college entrance exam is an achievement test and that the best preparation truly is studying hard in a demanding high school and reading and writing as much as possible. Still, as long as there is unequal access to excellent college preparatory schools, equal opportunity as Conant conceived it will not be realized. Coaching will continue under the new SAT, since parents naturally want to give their children every possible advantage. But by calling attention to the deficiencies of so many public schools, the new test should at least fuel pressure for the reforms (including school choice and vouchers) necessary to rectify or ameliorate them.
His optimism is heartening, but I stand by my prediction above. The new SAT will increasingly reveal the shoddy schools, and the NEA and teacher's unions will rush to defend these schools by demonizing the "bias" of the new, achievement-based SAT. As long as tests reveal inadequate schooling, inadequate educators will criticize the tests.