By 2020, the College Board will expand the use of a student’s socioeconomic disadvantages or advantages against them regarding their SAT scores. Many colleges say they want to admit more applicants who are socioeconomically disadvantaged. However, many colleges question how a student would be considered disadvantaged and also making sure that some students that have grown up with major deficits get the extra edge in admissions decisions.
“This is a tool designed for admission officers to view a student’s academic accomplishment in the context of where they live and learn,” a spokeswoman for the College Board said. “It doesn’t provide information about the student, but rather provides information about the student’s environment. It puts a student’s SAT score and other academic accomplishments included in their college application in the context of where they live and learn.”
The College Board has just finished the first two steps of the system, the Environmental Context Dashboard. This system is designed to help colleges be more precise when deciding who should get this extra edge. The system works in one of two ways. When students take the PSAT or the SAT, they will enter their information of where they live and about the high school that they attend. The College Board then uses that information to create an index on adversity based on three simple calculations: the environments of the high school, neighborhood, and family.
Students have not liked this feature because of how some students could get the cunning edge when they apply to a certain college. “I think that this would help some students, but it would also put others at a disadvantage,” junior Mahmoud Osman said. “Personally, I like this idea but it depends on how much of a cunning edge I get on it.”
The College Board expanding the use of a student’s environment may work for some, but dramatically enhance or diminish their chances of getting into their dream college. Many of these students think that some of their chances of getting into college will be lowered because they come from a good family. This whole system should be removed due to the fact that it puts others ahead of one another.