The alarm on your phone goes off at 7am, and your sluggish body must get up and get ready for the long hours ahead of you. You make sure you get a good breakfast in, and immediately are on you way to school, but this time it’s different because all you need are number two pencils, calculator, and your admission ticket. Once you get there, you are told your room number and head into the room that you will be in for the next four to five hours. The teacher in the room passes out a scantron booklet and a booklet to you. Once everyone has one, the teacher then tells you that you have a certain amount of time to complete the section, and then it’s go time. Standardized testing has been around since the late 50s and is still used today for college purposes. Most colleges, if not all, have required either the SAT or ACT in order to get into their school, but there are some college cases where they don’t require either of the tests because they realize that this 4-5 hour testing doesn’t really show your ability in intelligence, let alone your characteristics.
As a highschool student, juniors and seniors are required to take the ACT or SAT for college admissions. With that, many schools have ACT or SAT standards in order to get into their schools. Now while I get why they have these standards, I believe that the ACT and SAT should be optional. The reason being is because if you are like me, you tend to struggle with these standardized testings. I, personally, have never scored well on the ACT, and I studied everyday at the library for at least an hour and a half until test day. The first time I took the ACT, I got a 21 as my composite score, and that hit me hard because all the schools that I wanted to go to required a higher score. With that initial score, I tried to do something different and decided to get two tutors; one for math and one for english, reading, and science. I met these tutors once a week and was given packets for homework, and on top of that, I was using my ACT book. I, again, had invested so many hours into studying for my next upcoming ACT test. Come test day, I make sure I have breakfast and get ready to leave for Wheaton Warrenville South High School. After five hours of testing, I leave that place with a sense of confidence that I did well on my ACT. A few weeks later, my testing scores were out, and my initial thought was that I was going to get a good score back. I thought, for sure, I had scored a high twenty/low thirty, but as soon as I saw my scores, I actually did the opposite and scored an overall 23. I was so infuriated because I had put so many hours into studying and saw two tutors, and I got nothing good out of either of them. It angered me because my ACT score did not reflect my intelligence. The testing started to make me underestimate myself because I felt like my college choices wouldn’t want me due to my score. At this point, I didn’t want to retake the test because I thought to myself “what was the point of taking it if I’m not going to do well on it?” I started to question my intelligence because the schools weren’t really going to see how good of a student I was due to a poor composite grade. As you can see, standardized testing can undermine one’s confidence, especially if they are a good student. It makes a high achiever student think lesser of themselves, which then causes problems in their work ethic and confidence.
During junior year, parents and the school make the ACT or SAT seem like a huge deal because this test is one of the main factors when admitting students into colleges. Many colleges base their decisions off of these testing, which in my opinion is naive of them because these tests aren’t even testing your true intelligence. These tests are only testing what you know in a time span of four hours not four years. I believe that your high school GPA says more about you than your ACT or SAT scores. In a study done by Matthew Chingo, he found out that those with a higher GPA had a better chance of graduating college. For example, a student with a high SAT score but a somewhat low GPA only had a thirty nine percent chance of graduating, but a student with a high GPA and a low SAT score had a sixty two percent chance of graduating from college. The reason being is because standardized testing only tests to see if you are a good test taker, while your GPA gives the college a sense of what you are like in a classroom environment. Your GPA shows your ability of thinking critically, attaining goals, dedication, and perseverance. I’m sure other students would agree with this because I’m guessing if you gathered a group of highschoolers and you asked if they had a good GPA but a low SAT or ACT test scores, there would definitely be a few or more hands raised. As much as I would hate to admit it, I, too, fall under that category, and let me tell you, I am a hard worker, but for some reason, I am not a good test taker when talking about the ACT or SAT. With this being a common issue within our generation, I think colleges should take into account that your “smart” kids aren’t always going to test well, especially in a tight time span. They need to realize that the GPA gives a better depiction of a student than the standardized tests because the GPA is over a span of four years, while the tests only last four or five hours.
After several years, there have been reports of schools who have a ‘No ACT/SAT policy”. With that, they want to focus more on you as a person because they believe a test score shouldn’t define you. One school who has taken this action is Hampshire College, and when they did, they raised the standards for applications. As a result, the college received quality rather than quantity because the applicants were more motivated, mature, and disciplined. Hampshire College, also, had an increase of thirty one percent in class diversity because they wanted to know who you are as a person and not a test score. With this increase, the diversity was able to enrich the educational experience more than most schools. A school should always have a high percentage of diversity because others experiences and views can promote a healthy society and personal growth. Another school that followed roughly the same path with the exception of making SAT or ACT optional was the University of Chicago. This school, similarly to Hampshire College, believed that test scores shouldn’t define who you are. This university wanted to give all ethnicity groups a fair opportunity in applying. The reason being is because not everyone has access or the money to receive help from SAT or ACT tutors or classes. Even though both standardized tests try to make it fair for all groups, there is still a disadvantaged for lower income families which are the resources to get help. With an optional test policy, both colleges were able to get a better grip on a student’s likelihood for success because they focused more on the GPA and the essays that shed light on who the student was as a person.
While this might take years for all universities to have an optional testing policy, I believe that the schools should focus more on the essays, recommendations, and GPA with an additional piece added to the equation. This new piece would be a test, but instead of measuring your “intelligence”, it would give the school a better understanding of who you are and your characteristics. With this additional test, it would allow the schools to see what type of people are applying to their school because when colleges are looking at you, they are more interested in the type of student you are hence why many colleges require a letter of recommendation and GPA. The colleges want to see if you are a perfect match for their school because each school holds different standards for their students in order to assure success. Colleges want to help you succeed, and with a personal test, they can get a better more realistic picture of who you are. As briefly mentioned, a letter of recommendation should be required because it gives the college a different view of how others perceive a student when in a classroom environment, especially since teachers are the ones who have first hand experience with students. If you think about it, most college’s admission staff don’t personally meet a student face to face, it’s all done through a computer, but with the help of a letter of recommendation from a teacher, it gives the admission staff a better understanding of a students behavior and personality.
As hard as it is to get rid of SAT/ACT completely, if schools made it optional to high school students, they would be able to focus more on you as a person. The reason being is because these standardized test scores make you into a number of false intelligence rather than your true intelligence and characteristics.There is more to you than just a test score number.. Plus, there are a handful of highschoolers, similar to me, that have a high GPA, yet don’t do well on standardized testing even though they put in the extra work to do well on the test. Then when it’s time for colleges to look at your application, you might be turned down because of one thing, your score. That to me seems unfair because the ACT or SAT don’t determine who you are; that comes through your high school GPA, college essay, and/or letter of recommendation. There are some colleges who are starting to realize this, which is why they have a no ACT/SAT policy or optional testing policy. With more schools becoming like this, they are upping their standards for admission, which is ultimately showing them the characteristics of different students because of the quality applications they receive each year.