Update to "Dumbing down the SAT"
So, let me give you some insight into how a psychometrician reads this article by hitting a couple of key points...
"The problem since the Sixties has been that some now demand equality of result — and more. For many on the Left, even inequalities of intelligence and physical difference are now forbidden. "
Oooh, that's a big problem for us. You see, psychometrics is the social science that is devoted to making distinctions between people on the basis of some mental attribute like opinions, personality, intelligence, aptitude. We even use the politically-incorrect word, "discrimination", although mainly amongst ourselves because we know that we mean it only in the morally neutral definition of discriminating one person from another. That's why, instead of just giving an impressionistic, qualitative view of algebra skill, or tendency towards depression, or opinion of Dubya's Mideast policy, we try to measure these things.
"Colleges do, and should, take these measures of achievement into account. The point of the SAT is to add something new and important to the mix — a test of general aptitude. An aptitude test actually works in favor of students who come from lesser high schools but have the potential to achieve at higher levels in college."
This is one of those points that psychometricians are forever making, and people are forever disbelieving. Why don't they believe that a standardized test might be beneficial to students we tend to think of as "disadvantaged"?
In part, it's because there are those who think they improve the current educational reform debate by dragging up the old eugenics research , the better to throw dirt on the current tests and testers. While the article at Rethinking Schools is one of the more balanced that I've read, my answer to it is that psychometrics is no more or less a product of the time in which it was developed than any other social or biological science. I'd like to see evidence that, in the 1920's, the despicable racism that was part and parcel of this nation infested only psychometrics, and not medicine, sociology, biology, clinical psychology, etc. Do we see journalists today reminding us that we should approach the newest applications and developments in medicine with caution and suspicion because a lot of doctors and geneticists threw their weight behind the eugenic arguments in the 1920's? No, we don't. Psychometrics did gain attention by being part of the eugenics movement, but psychometrics has not been about the eugenics movement for at least sixty years. Unfortunately, there are still those who view my entire field as a creation to keep white men on top of the heap, and they view all of our current work through those distorted lenses.
"And of course, instead of seeking out potential critics of the policy, the Times simply went for comment to Nicholas Lemann, a prominent advocate of affirmative action and critic of the SAT. This is a lesson in how press bias really works. Not only does the Times puff up stories on social changes that it likes by front-paging them, it downplays changes likely to arouse conservative opposition."
Mr. Kurtz probably has no idea how much it thrills me to see any opposition published anywhere about this. As far as I can tell, newspapers almost never quote anyone who is supportive of standardized testing or an expert in the field (I mentioned this on one of my first postings, near the bottom of this page). One reason is that we psychometricians tend to stay locked up in the research labs and confidentiality agreements keep us from commenting on a lot of the work that we do. Another reason is that standardized testing is an interesting combination of politically incorrect and personally traumatizing - even people who support testing often don't enjoy taking these tests - so criticizing us is safe and easy.
I've only been out of school and working for a few years. I am already impressed with the amount of hard work and dedication I have seen psychometricians and test specialists put forth in the effort to (1) improve education by improving assessment of schoolchildren, (2) improve the test-taking scenario both from a measurement and test-taker perspective, (3) help colleges better identify those students who could do well if given the chance, and (4) deal with issues regarding differences of race and sex in educational performance and test scores. We think our efforts mean something, and we think our tests can help change things for the better. But you'll never read that in the New York Times.
...and a tip of the hat here to my new favorite blog, Campus Nonsense, who also linked to the SAT article. It's been three years since I got out of graduate school, and while I was there I was exposed to political viewpoints that ran the gamut all the way from far left to, gee, middle left. Big surprise. If my university even had a free-speech, free-market, or general anti-idiotarian group, I never knew about it. But now I do.