Re: Fwd: In response to Judi's statement to Deanna

[Sherman Dorn <dorn@TYPHOON.COEDU.USF.EDU>]

Kristen Huff wrote, in describing the motivation for multiple-choice and
short-answer tests:

> Creating short answer or multiple choice tests to administer to classroom
> students is, in part, in response to the fact that there is not enough time
> available to assessors (teachers) or the folks who use the teachers'
> assessments (policy-makers, college admission officers, etc) to do the kind of
> assessment described above. What if I were a college admission officer and
> each application had only qualitative assessments from a variety of people
> instead of a combination of quantitative and qualitative assessments? Think
> about the time involved in culling through these applications.

I'll only reply about college admissions testing.  Unfortunately,
standardized admissions exams are subject neither to opportunity-cost
analysis in an institution, nor are they only (or perhaps even
primarily!) used for sorting students.  Institutions pay only a small
fraction of the time and cost of SATs, ACTs, and other admissions tests,
through the time it takes to look at the scale scores.  The vast
majority of the cost is borne by the applicant and is thus hidden to the
institution.  To say that Generic State University chose to require SAT
or ACT scores because it was cheaper and easier is incorrect; what that
requirement does is *shift* the cost of evaluation to prospective
applicants, many of whom effectively pay a testing company to disqualify
them from various colleges.  I've had this fantasy of changing the pay
structure of admissions tests so that the institutions that want them
have to pay (and thus charge more in the application fee).  How many
institutions, in this thought experiment, would continue to require such
admission test scores if the opportunity cost was in their face, and
they could either spend the several million dollars on admissions tests
or on personnel in the admissions office for other functions (such as
more intensive looks at applicants or more recruiting)?

Friends have convinced mre, however, that this thought experiment
wouldn't have the result I'd like.  Private, liberal-arts colleges
certainly do not need admissions test scores for decision-making; I've
talked with a handful enough to know that the test scores generally
confirm, more than change, decisions already made on the basis of other
information.  However, such colleges do have a use for admissions tests
in marketing.  What is one of the key ways that people find out about
the exclusivity (and presumed utility) of private colleges?  Similarly,
public institutions would face an outcry from state legislators if they
made admissions tests voluntary -- "lowering standards" would be the
criticism (and if, in my relative ignorance, I am unaware of a state
where such a suggestion is serious, someone could probably [dis]confirm
my prediction).  That dynamic exists even within individual
departments:  I told one friend who was applying to a masters program
recently not to worry about a failure in physics in college.  First, I
explained, that was ten years ago, and most people understand such
errors of youth.  Second, his GRE scores were very high, and I explained
cynically that the department was probably drooling to get him to raise
their average for incoming graduate students.  Sure enough, he shortly
afterwards received an acceptance and enthusiastic encouragement to
enter.  I only hope that they truly wanted him for his commitment to the
program more than for his GRE score.

--
Yours,

Sherman Dorn
University of South Florida
http://www.coedu.usf.edu/~dorn

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