More Dishonesty From Colleges: Dropping The SAT Requirement

A college's ideal press release will suggest their compassion and understanding for the student, particularly for those who "don't test well."

Baloney. Pure. Extra Virgin.

It's part of the PC mentality that runs amok on colleges campuses everywhere. Two examples are illustrated in today's NY Times: Smith College & Wake Forest.

From Wake Forest University: “By making the SAT and ACT optional, we hope to broaden the applicant pool and increase access at Wake Forest for groups of students who are currently underrepresented (italics added) at selective universities,” Martha Allman, director of admissions at Wake Forest, told the Times.

Did you get the gobbledigook in this statement? "Underrepresented" what? Are they dummies whose test scores don't meet the school's "extraordinary" standards?

Here's the veiled truth in the Times article that gets missed: "Applicants to both schools will have the option to submit their test scores." Read: we colleges want to use these test scores as a tie-breaker with equally competiting students. Plus, if truth be told, we want to make our decisions easier, our jobs easier, not more difficult.

If colleges could be accused of trying to monopolize dishonesty, this is a validating example.

To demonstrate the success of such a press release, this one was issued 2 years ago by Holy Cross College (Worcester, MA), which asked this question: "Why would a student submit standardized test scores if they don't have to?" Their answer: "A student might decide that his or her test score gives a more competitive picture of academic achievements and potential."

Replace the word "student" with the word "college" in the above statement and you have Truth in Advertising. Like most elitist colleges, Holy Cross likes to engage in feel-good Oprah babble to make us all feel warm and fuzzy about what they represent, or more accurately, how they market their image. After all, these colleges are a business whose strategy is to design, package, market, and sell their image. They've attended expensive marketing seminars where they have learned that perception is reality, and reality is what they want parents and students to perceive, not actually what is.

So far roughly 70% of students who apply to colleges that require no standardized test scores submit their SAT and ACT scores anyway. Talk about being competitive.

If you were working in the admissions office, what would you be thinking of those applications that did NOT come with their SAT scores? "Hmmmm...does this student have something to hide?" How's that for reality?

Bottom Line: If these colleges were honest and forthright, they would require that their applicants not submit their standardized test scores. When the first college in the United States makes non-submittal of test scores a requirement in its application process, watch for this TV news headline: "Hell freezes over. Film at eleven."



The dishonesty of "non-SAT" colleges is astounding, proving once again that marketing their image trumps the truth we parents deserve.