Ever since several top foreign colleges such as Harvard, Princeton, MIT have made the standardised tests optional for admissions, many students believe that they have lost their relevance now.
For international students it was always an important criterion for evaluation but now with only schools’ academic performance as the benchmark, colleges find it challenging and impossible to differentiate between two competitive candidates.
Hence, students applying for admissions only with their schools’ academic performance have seen a higher rate of rejection in colleges where these tests are optional. Of late, it has also been observed that these tests give a competitive edge to a candidate in admissions.
Standardised tests, also known as competitive international entrance exams test students on a set of parameters and come with a certain benchmark. The Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) for general subjects, the Graduate Record Examination (GRE) for engineering and science and the Graduate Management Admission Test (GMAT) for managements students used to be mandatory exams in the pre-Covid times for admissions in several colleges in the US and Canada.
Aids fair assessment
As these countries attract students from across the globe for higher studies, a standardised test makes it easy for colleges to assess the aptitude of students coming from diverse backgrounds. Also, every country has its own assessment system for grading and marking, which makes it really difficult for colleges to assess the academic potential of a student on the basis of their mark-sheets only.
"High school grades have great value, but they are subject to variability from place to place. Teacher recommendations are also important, but they too can vary. Standardised admissions tests offer colleges and universities a fair and impartial way to compare students from different school situations,” the Educational Testing Service (ETS), informs on its website. ETS is a private non-profit organisation that conducts standardized admissions tests including the TOEFL and GRE for colleges and universities abroad. ETS also collaborates with non-profit organization, College Board, to conduct the SAT and AP exams.
Why tests made optional
According to experts, there are two main reasons for making standardised tests optional. “SAT, GRE and GMAT are a significant part of studying in the USA. These tests have been an essential component for evaluating students' profiles, but these tests have become optional due to the pandemic,” Piyush Kumar, Regional Director (South Asia), IDP Education, said.
It’s also about sheer economics for the global institutions that depend heavily on global students. “Colleges including even the high-ranked ones need international students for financial reasons. They get at least three times more fees than a local candidate. So, they decided to accept applications without SAT score,” a top global education counsellor said requesting anonymity.
Around the same time, an argument gained ground that only well-off students could get the benefit of standardised tests as they could afford to hire top-class teachers, spend good money on preparation and get good marks that help them get admission to good colleges.
Consequent to these developments, many colleges decided to do away with the mandatory requirement of standardised tests.
Should one take tests?
Now the question is, “When the standardised tests are optional and colleges are accepting applications directly, should a student still appear for these?” A section of experts dealing in foreign education matters answers in the affirmative.
They are of the view that colleges themselves are facing challenges in selecting students with the number of applications going up by three-fold.
“University of Michigan, one of the top colleges in the US, have sent letters to parents stating their admission is postponed as the numbers have grown significantly for undergraduate admissions and they are not able to process all the applications in the desired time,” said Adarsh Khandelwal, co-founder & director of Collegify, a global firm for helping students to apply to top institutions abroad.
Khandelwal suggests that if candidates aim for a top college in the US, Singapore, Hong Kong, they must take a standardised test as it brightens their chance for admissions and shows another metric where they can excel.
“How will the international colleges differentiate the academic potential of candidates? It was always through the standardised tests,” he says.
To substantiate his argument, he cites the example of The Georgia Institute of Technology, which has recently declared the admission results. “Almost all the candidates, so far as I know, who have been selected had applied with their standardised test results,” Khandelwal argued.
Another set of experts believes international students, especially those from India, stand to benefit by writing SAT. They argue that with optional standardised tests, admissions officers will have to rely heavily on regular academic performances, meaning grades, over the four years of high school.
“Covid and remote schooling for last 2+ years have made that highly volatile. Many schools adopted pass/fail for several subjects and grade inflation is on the rise. AP tests, similar to SAT, have suffered cancellations and delays rendering those less effective as a differentiator,” said Arindam Mukhopadhyay, a senior professional in a US-based financial services company.
He argues that as a result, most admission offices are facing a serious challenge of objective measurement and increasingly, subjective assessment is becoming the norm which can hurt a student in a big way.
Students from India are also at a disadvantage because our school system, by and large, is not geared towards developing those subjective qualities amongst its students. “So, even if officially optional, if a student is taking SAT and scoring high, in more ways than one, it does add to the standing of the applicant in a competitive pool, especially when there is very little to differentiate using objective criteria,” Mukhopadhyay adds.
