New Yorker staff writer and journalism professor Lemann, author of a previous title on the SAT (The Big Test), contributes to Princeton\u2019s \u201cOur Compelling Interests\u201d series by addressing the problem of access to higher education. With some selective colleges and universities reinstating the standardized SAT as an admissions criterion (after dropping the requirement during the Covid-19 pandemic) and with the Supreme Court ruling against affirmative action, his examination is timely. Lemann\u2019s detailed history of the development of the SAT, first administered in 1926, depicts the test\u2019s creators as aiming to create \u201ca more democratically selected educated elite.\u201d But he cites many studies to show that test scores are highly influenced by socioeconomic status, therefore reinforcing class differences. Furthermore, the SAT serves as a poor indicator of college success, adding little to what is learned from the high school transcript. The SAT\u2019s predictive ability, he reveals, is highest for the short term, falling off over the full length of college. While arguing for tests that reflect learning and achievement rather than the SAT, Lemann raises two overarching questions: What is meant by merit? What is the purpose of access to education? Only a minority of students go to selective colleges, Lemann reveals: “The widespread administration of the SAT to millions of people in order to identify a relative handful to admissions officers at highly selective colleges” makes no sense. \u201cThe most obvious problem in American higher education today,\u201d he argues, is “its failure to produce a more widely successful experience for most students.\u201d Fulfilling that goal requires enacting aggressive reforms in the K-12 years geared to equipping \u201cas many people as possible for as broad a set of life circumstances as possible.\u201d Lemann\u2019s cogent argument, along with three responses from educators, offers thoughtful reading for teachers and policymakers.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
New Yorker staff writer and journalism professor Lemann, author of a previous title on the SAT (The Big Test), contributes to Princeton\u2019s \u201cOur Compelling Interests\u201d series by addressing the problem of access to higher education. With some selective colleges and universities reinstating the standardized SAT as an admissions criterion (after dropping the requirement during the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":450,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-449","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-interesting"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/449"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=449"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/449\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/450"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=449"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=449"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bookloves.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=449"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}