Another Look at the SAT and Race

A new paper has rekindled one of the most controversial questions in the long history of the nation’s most famous test: Is the SAT racially biased?

In 2003, Roy O. Freedle, a retired senior research psychologist at the Educational Testing Service, took up the question in an article published in the Harvard Educational Review. His conclusion was that black students often do better than white students of similar ability on difficult SAT questions, but that they do worse than their white counterparts on easy items. He suggested that easy questions use a common vocabulary, making them more open to interpretation based on a test taker's cultural background.

Mr. Freedle’s conclusions were rejected by the test's backers, the College Board and the Educational Testing Service, which have long maintained that the test is not biased.

Now, two researchers who replicated Mr. Freedle’s methodology have published their findings in the latest issue of the Harvard Educational Review, as Jay Mathews of The Washington Post reported on Thursday. The researchers conclude that Mr. Freedle did detect a flaw in the SAT.

Some verbal questions, the researchers wrote, do function differently for the black and white subgroups: “The confirmation of unfair test results throws into question the validity of the test and, consequently, all decisions based on its results. All admissions decisions based exclusively or predominantly on SAT performance … appear biased against the African-American minority group and could be exposed to legal challenge.”

College Board officials told the Post that the new paper was flawed, and that ETS plans to publish a criticism of its findings. In the ongoing testing debate, some questions don't yield answers -- only more questions.

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Comments

1. 11144703 - June 18, 2010 at 08:11 am

The flaw should be framed differently: since Asians outperform Africans and whites on both east and hard questions, the test privileges Asians and appears biased against Africans and whites and exposes the test to legal challenge.

The disparity on the math test between Asians and Africans is enormous. A disparity exists on the language section between Asians and Africans even though a significant number of Asians aren't even native speakers, or have parents who are not native speakers.

Finally, the disparity between Asians and whites is significant enough to assume that Asians continue to be privileged by the SAT test makers. The question is: why are Asians being privileged in areas such as engineering, mathematics and physics, or classical music performance contests, or spelling bees?

2. chedie - June 18, 2010 at 04:23 pm

"Some verbal questions, the researchers wrote, do function differently for the black and white subgroups" This does not say the qustions function less-favorably for one group.

3. commserver - June 18, 2010 at 06:46 pm

I am Chinese-American. My parents stressed getting an education at an early age, which is due to the history and culture of China.

My daughter started her education when she went to KUMON to learn mathematics and then reading.

My daughter was then taught that getting an education was important. She eventually went to Hunter College HS in NYC which has a tradition of sending graduates to many of the elite colleges and university in the country. She was able to get 2360 on SAT, averaged 750 on SAT2 and got 4 5's and 1 3 on AP. All of this was due to her diligence in classwork. She has just completed her 1st year at Williams College, which is supposed to be #1 liberal arts college in country.

I think that my daughter isn't unique. The difference between Asians and others is the tradition of emphasizing education. This is something that is missing in many American families.

4. honore - June 20, 2010 at 10:12 pm

commserver, THANK YOU for your insightful if not politically-correct response.

At 1 Ivy that I worked at for over a decade in upper administration, the "minority affairs" offices systematically removed the names of all students with "Asian" names from their roster of Freshmen mailings. When I asked if this was a misperception on my part, the response was...

"if we allow them in, they will take all of our resources and after all they don't need any of our services, they're just wannabe whites anyway"

Before I left this school up on the hill, i had a conversation with the then-president and I shared this "finding" with him. His response was "I really don't want to get in between those colored people".

Update...the directorship of the "minority" affairs offices are all still there embracing "diversity" and their twisted version of fake "multi-culturalism" as long as it doesn't include ANY Asians and Hispanic-cultured students of European descent (White Puerto Ricans, Cubans, South Americans and even the children of Basques from Montana).

Good luck to your daughter at Williams. YOU did your job and she will not only survive but succeed in life.

The answer to this problem is a simple one...If the work of instilling life-long values, personal responsibility and hard work ethic is not done early in a child's life there is NOT a workshop, icebreaker or fireside chat during the Freshman year that is going to make up for what didn't happen YEARS earlier in that child's life.

Gotta run, my associate dean has demanded that all of us attend the most recent series of minority support welcomes. We really don't get to invested in them. We all know most of these "admits" won't be here next year.