Inside Furman is published quarterly by the Furman University Department of Marketing and Public Relations. For story ideas, e-mail John Roberts, editor.
The SAT should be:
O a requirement for all students applying to Furman
O optional for all students applying to Furman
O not required
Developed at the turn of the century, the Scholastic Achievement Test was used by prestigious colleges in the Northeast to identify talented students and grant scholarships.
Renamed Scholastic Aptitude Test in 1941, the SAT became more mainstreamed after World War II as returning soldiers, supported the by the G.I. bill, enrolled in colleges in record numbers. Because of the great disparity in the quality of public education across the nation, the egalitarian goals of the test were widely embraced. The standardized tests helped identify talented students from economically depressed and rural areas who would otherwise have been overlooked or denied access to a college education.
By the 1960s the SAT had become ingrained in American culture. Virtually every four-year college made the three-hour test mandatory. In the early 1990s, though, a growing number of educators and studies suggested that the test — renamed the Scholastic Assessment Test — was not a true measure of academic acumen or success in college.
Some colleges, primarily those in the Northeast who were the first to adopt the SAT, began making the test optional. Currently, more than 700 U.S. colleges and university do not require student applicants to submit SAT scores. Although most of those institutions have an open enrollment policy, some highly selective institutions, including Bates and Holy Cross, are re-examining their SAT requirement or have dropped the provision altogether.
Now Furman has joined the debate.
At the request of the President's Council, members of the university's seven-member Admissions Committee began examining the requirement earlier this year when stories questioning the reliability of SAT scores appeared in the national media.
The committee also gathered input from professors during the faculty retreat in September. After a session that included presentations by Benny Walker (Vice President for Enrollment), Woody O'Cain (Admissions Director), Bill Berg (Director of Institutional Planning and Research) and Judy Grisel (Chair of Faculty Admissions Committee), faculty split into smaller groups to discuss the topic.
Opinions varied. Some felt that the SAT requirement has served the admissions process well and should be continued. Others said the requirement was of little value and should be discontinued. Most, however, agreed that the university should take a pragmatic approach and research the subject further before revising the policy.
In South Carolina , Allen, Benedict, Morris, Voorhees and the University of South Carolina-Aiken do not require all applicants to submit SAT scores. None of Furman's primary competitors for students — Wake Forest , Davidson, Richmond , Vanderbilt, Rhodes , University of the South — have dropped the requirement.
Walker says, “The SAT provides a standardized measure for the 4,000 applicants [to Furman] from more than 2,000 high schools. If you don't require the SAT, then you have to replace it with some other evaluation that allows the Admissions Office to make the best decisions in admissions and financial aid in a timely manner. The issue [of eliminating the SAT requirement] is extremely complicated and we have to make sure it is the best choice for Furman."
Education professor Paul Thomas, a critic of the emphasis on standardized tests, says the SAT “is a terrible waste of time and money.”
“The [SAT] score can help identify a good student,” he says. “But there are some really great students hidden in those middle and weak scores. It's perfectly fine to pick out the elite, but if you do the converse thing and discount students who make low and medium scores, you are making a terrible mistake.”
Thomas said a study at Bates College in Maine showed no correlation between undergraduate academic success (high grade point average and graduation rates) and high SAT scores.
Currently, Furman considers five primary categories when evaluating applicants: quality of high school curriculum, GPA, essay quality, SAT score and extracurricular activities. Walker says curriculum and GPA are weighted the heaviest with essay quality and extracurricular activities being considered least. SAT scores fall in the middle.
In recent years, the average SAT score for incoming freshmen has fallen between 1275 and 1301. The average score for the Class of 2010 was 1287, compared with 1301 for the Class of 2009.
“Furman has become so attractive and selective that we don't have to worry about making a class,” says Walker . “We can focus on shaping a class. This [dropping the SAT requirement] is just one of the options we are considering.”
Even if the university dropped the SAT requirement, the test would continue to play a role in the admissions process. All South Carolina high school seniors applying for the Palmetto and Life scholarships are required to take the SAT. The NCAA, too, requires the SAT.
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