GRE Adds Prof Rankings to Compete w. GMAT
GRE ADDS PROF RECS TO COMPETE WITH GMAT: COMMENTATORS GIGGLE, BUT HARD TO SAY WHO IS RIGHT.
hmmmmmmmm, first the news: fr. INSIDE HIGHER ED. http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2008/05/22/etsThe GRE [will be ] using the “Personal Potential Index,” starting in July 2009. . . . .In the index, three or four professors or supervisors — generally those who will also be writing letters of recommendation — will answer a series of questions . . .in six areas: knowledge and creativity, communication skills, team work, resilience, planning and organization, and ethics and integrity. Those filling out the forms would also be able to provide narrative answers on each of those areas. . . .
ETS officials acknowledge that the PPI is part of their pitch to attract more business schools to the GRE — a major goal of ETS, and one on which it appears to be making some headway, since it lost the contract for the Graduate Management Admission Test.
AND NOW THE PEANUT GALLERY RESPONDS TO NEW GRE PPI STUNT -AND I GOTTA SAY, AS SOMEONE WHO READS A LOT OF B SCHOOL RECS, AND, AHEM, OFTEN EDITS THEM, THOSE BOXES WITH THE RANKINGS, FR. SUPER-DUPER TO ROAD KILL, ARE THE LEAST VALUABLE AND MOST ARBITRARY PARTS, BUT THAT IS WHAT SEEMINGLY THIS NEW PPI INDEX WILL ENTAIL. PEE-PEE ON PPI ANYONE???? SOME BLOGGERS APPARENTLY HAVE, SEE BELOW
Idiotic
This is a harebrained solution to a problem that may not exist. As anyone who has ever reviewed applications or written a letter of recommendation knows, the “ranking” questions used by some institutions’ recommendation forms are nearly useless. One professor’s 5 is another’s 3. I’m not a statistician, but I do know that in a small survey sample, there is no way to control for such variations. Besides, many professors refuse to answer those questions or just give high scores across the board, showing resistance to the whole concept of crude rankings of abilities. Students already submit faculty letters that give narratives of their cognitive and non-cognitive skills. I don’t see any way ETS’s numbers will improve the evaluation process. Just read the letters if you want to get to know an applicant’s personality.
J. Staines, Assistant Professor at CUNY, at 7:40 am EDT on May 22, 2008
Rate My Student
Oh, goody, finally: a chance for professors to fill out bubble sheets on our students, en masse, rating them on unquantifiable things about which we are unprepared and perhaps unqualified to judge them and which may or may not predict their long-term success as learners, such as their potential, their attitude, their joyousness in learning, and whether they made us feel professorial and beloved. All’s right with the world, at last.
Is there anyone here who hasn’t ever looked at one of those recommendation-sheet grids — “rate this student as Top 1%, Top 5%, Top 10%, or Really Pathetic in the following categories” — and found themselves sorely tempted to inflate the score for a student who’s merely *likeable* or one who has “struggled” in some way, whether or not we think he or she has the intellectual prowess being measured? Anyone who hasn’t looked at such a category — Personal Devotedness, say, or Experiential Acumen — and thought, “Geez, I only read a couple of her exams, how the hay am I supposed to judge her on this?”
If the student is likely to be better than her scores predict, she deserves a full narrative testifying to that fact; if a graduate program wants to find the best candidates rather than the best test-takers, they should demand and attend to evidence beyond GRE scores. Any attempt to take a short-cut will bring short-cut returns, and the test-makers will be the only ones who come out ahead.
ezry, at 7:55 am EDT on May 22, 2008
This is evil
This totally kills the point of the GRE. You want to get something anonymous that shows how people compare on a completely objective — even if flawed — measure. Now we’re going to see all cultural biases get doubled. Look, professors already write qualitative recommendations. They already give qualitative grades. This is makes it look scientific, but it’s not.
Predictions: Good looking students get higher scores.
Uncreative suckups will get higher scores than independent creative minded students.
Students of different ethnicity, gender, sexuality or faith than recommenders get lower scores.
Sexual and financial scandals will occur with professors receiving gifts in exchange for scores.
Professor grades will rapidly converge to say that every student is perfect.
urbanprof, at 8:35 am EDT on May 22, 2008
