Standardized Testing Pros and Cons in College Admissions | BestColleges (2024)

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Standardized Testing Pros and Cons in College Admissions | BestColleges? ›

Research shows that SAT/ACT scores are better at predicting college GPAs than high school GPAs. However, preparing for standardized tests takes time and money. Additionally, research shows a correlation between test scores and factors like an applicant's race and socioeconomic status.

Standardized test scores have traditionally been an important consideration in college admissions decisions. These tests were first used in the 1930s by Ivy League and other elite colleges as a way to broaden their applicant pools beyond students coming from privileged East Coast boarding schools.

Standardized tests can highlight achievement gaps between student groups, like those from different socioeconomic backgrounds. By pinpointing these disparities, educators and policymakers can develop targeted strategies to bridge these gaps and ensure all students get the support they need.

But a solid score for a student from a less privileged background is often a sign of enormous potential. “Standardized test scores are a much better predictor of academic success than high school grades,” Christina Paxson, the president of Brown University, recently wrote.

The shift away from standardized tests

Critics argued that these tests favored students from higher socioeconomic backgrounds, who could afford extensive test preparation, and failed to accurately reflect the potential of students from diverse backgrounds.

These include the loss of classroom time devoted to learning traditional subjects, added stress on teachers and students, less interesting and in-depth curricula, and a lack of focus on important skills students need to participate in a global economy.

Standardized tests measure little of what parents and others want children to learn and experience in schools. They do not measure creativity, critical thinking, collaboration, leadership or empathy. Many schools narrow their focus to the tested subjects of math and reading. Other important subjects are sidelined.

Since their inception almost a century ago, the tests have been instruments of racism and a biased system. Decades of research demonstrate that Black, Latin(o/a/x), and Native students, as well as students from some Asian groups, experience bias from standardized tests administered from early childhood through college.

Colleges can request our scores but it seems like it's being discouraged. Also, according to the Smarter Balance website they're looking at the reliability and validity of the test right now.

Does standardized testing help or hurt students? ›

Standardized tests scores are good indicators of college and job success. Standardized tests can promote and offer evidence of academic rigor, which is invaluable in college as well as in students' careers.

It drives students and teachers away from learning, and at times from school. It narrows, distorts, weakens and impoverishes the curriculum while fostering forms of instruction that fail to engage students or support high-quality learning.

In an article from the Los Angeles Times, The American Psychological Association has studied teenagers from ages 13 to 17 to better understand how they are impacted by standardized testing. In 2020, the study showed that 87 percent of students feel that standardized tests amplify their stress.

SAT scores help colleges compare students from different high schools. Your scores show your strengths and readiness for college work. But remember standardized test scores are just one part of your college application, along with grades, course rigor, and recommendations.

Research shows that SAT/ACT scores are better at predicting college GPAs than high school GPAs. However, preparing for standardized tests takes time and money. Additionally, research shows a correlation between test scores and factors like an applicant's race and socioeconomic status.

Because students' GPAs are affected by a greater range of academic skills deployed across a broader range of subjects, GPA is a much more robust indicator of a student's ability to succeed in college.

Well, yes and no. It depends on your goals. If your desired outcome is for your child simply to attend college, then your child is on the right track. If, however, you have more ambitious goals for your child, such as an elite college or a UC school, you'll need to give further consideration to the STAR test results.

More than 80 percent of US colleges and universities do not require applicants to take standardized tests—like the SAT or the ACT. However, the news cycle is driven by elite institutions, not the institutions where most college students go to school.