One of the longest running academic debates in our lifetimes has been whether or not SAT & ACT scores carry any predictive value in determining success in college. What’s odd, though, is that only one side has evidence supporting its position.
The SAT & ACT have ALWAYS been predictive. If they weren’t, colleges would not have adopted them so long ago–the first SAT was administered in 1926.
Traditionally, the calculus was that grades and test scores on their own provided good insight into student success in the first year of college, but that the two data points together offer even better assurance of college readiness.
Despite the turmoil of pandemic-era politics, the predictive validity of test scores is not just accepted but embraced in many admissions offices in 2024, especially at the most selective academic institutions:
SAT and ACT tests are better predictors of Harvard grades than high school grades. – Harvard
Standardized test scores are a much better predictor of academic success than high school grades. – Brown
Test scores are the single largest predictor of a student’s academic performance at Yale, and this is true over all four years, and it’s true even when we control for every other available variable that we can. – Yale
Just getting straight A’s is not enough information for us to know whether the students are going to succeed or not. – M.I.T.
Why are the more selective schools doubling down on test scores? The main issue is that, with each passing year, GPA seems to mean less and less. I asked whether an A means anything anymore back in 2017. In 2024, exceptional grades mean even less, at least in the broader sense–students should still be trying to earn their best grades through diligence, study, and academic curiosity!
The latest evidence of rampant grade inflation comes from the Higher Education Research Institute at UCLA, which has been administering the CIRP Freshman Survey (TFS) for over 50 years. One of the metrics the survey tracks is the percentage of freshman at 4-year universities with an A average or its equivalent. In 1966–the first year of this survey–less than 25% of students entered college with an A average. In 2023, the percentage exceeded 85%:
In that same period, SAT and ACT scores not only remained flat but dipped a bit. Additional data from other national standardized tests do not, unfortunately, support the conclusion that the United States is producing the smartest teens in history. Rather, we can painfully conclude that school grades subject to all manner of opinion and imprecision don’t tell us as much about student achievement as they used to.
The question, then, may not be if SAT & ACT scores are more predictive than GPA, but by exactly how much?
For deeper analysis of the data depicting declining academic preparedness and rising grade inflation, dive into David Blobaum’s article on How Are SAT and ACT Scores More Predictive Than High School Grades?
Mike Bergin