201: Test Optional Admissions 101: What, Why, Where, Who?

Ethan Sawyer  0:08  
Hey, friends, it's Ethan Sawyer, your boy, College Essay Guy, I should say your guy. This is the College Essay Guy podcast where it's my job, my aim, my mission, to bring more ease, joy and purpose into the college application process. How by interviewing interesting and brilliant and informed and wise human beings, people who have spent a lot of time in this college admissions world, analyzing their genius and breaking it down for you into practical, actionable steps that you can take, whether you're applying to college or that you can help someone else take if you're helping someone else. Someone else apply to college. Now, this is my first episode in season two. Yay bells going off and stuff. I probably should have a sound effect there, but I don't. We did 24 episodes last year, and I'm saying we because I'm not the one doing all the work. Imagine that. That would be bonkers. We did 24 episodes. This is the first one of season two, and it's the first in a mini series on testing. So I'm gonna do three episodes. The first one is from Bob Schafer, and I'll tell you who he is in just a second. And I'm particularly excited because he's talking about test optional admissions, which in some cases, students and parents don't know what that even means. So I'm excited that that's kicking off our testing set here. So who is Bob Shaffer? He's the public education director of fair test, which is the National Center for fair and open testing, a nonprofit that advocates for better forms of Student Assessment. And why is this podcast important? Well, I'll tell you, I think that a lot of students assume that they like have to take the s, a T or a C, T, or that all schools require. You know these tests for all students. And that's just not true, as Bob will tell you in a few minutes. In fact, he's got a list of test optional schools he updates regularly, which I'll let him tell you about on this episode we discuss. I hit him with a quick question of like, Bob, are standardized tests evil? Listen to what he's got to say on that. What are some other standardized test myths that people tend to believe. To what extent does the SAT or AC team measure? What students need to know in college? There are some important stats that he'll tell you about from crossing the finish line, which is a book that outlines research around how well standardized test scores predict actual student performance. What's the difference between test optional and test flexible? If students don't submit their standardized test scores. Does this have an impact on scholarships and financial aid? Does applying to college without a test score hurt a student's chances? I mean, like honestly, and some advice for students with test scores that are, quote, unquote, just okay, what should those students do? So I love the perspective Bob brings, and I think this conversation is a great way to start this mini series. So enjoy. Hi. My guest today is Bob Shaffer. He's the public education director of fair test, which is the National Center for fair and open testing, a non profit that advocates for better forms of Student Assessment. He's an expert on the A, C, T, S, A, T and test optional admissions. Bob compiles fair test popular list of accredited bachelor degree granting schools that'll make admissions decisions about all or many applicants, without regard to test scores. And he's widely quoted on the topic. I'm really excited to talk about that. I'm excited to meet you, Bob. Hi and welcome. Thank


Bob Schaeffer  3:16  
you. Ethan, appreciate the opportunity. So


Ethan Sawyer  3:19  
I want to first, I want to ask this question, which is deliberately provocative, do you are standardized tests? Evil Bob?


Bob Schaeffer  3:28  
I wouldn't say evil in terms of the college admissions process. They're largely unnecessary, and when used improperly, they can be harmful to both academic quality and equity. Say


Ethan Sawyer  3:40  
more. Say a little bit more about that. I'm curious. Well,


Bob Schaeffer  3:44  
there's ample evidence that test scores for most applicants don't provide much useful information beyond what's already in the academic record. But when you rely heavily on test scores to make decisions about admissions or scholarship, you end up skewing the process, tilting the playing field to kids who are strong test takers, not necessarily strong students, and particularly to those whose parents can afford high priced test prep, to the steroids that help boost test scores, but not real learning. Yeah,


Ethan Sawyer  4:17  
say, I'm really especially interested in that last point, what have you seen in terms of, you know, what determines how well students do on the tests? Well,


Bob Schaeffer  4:25  
the strongest correlate of test scores is family income. The sap is a very good measure of where you've come from and whether you've had, what kind of opportunities you've had since, literally before birth, in terms of prenatal nutrition and birth weight, kids who've grown up in well to do homes have had every opportunity in life, and to some extent, that shows on the test, but it doesn't mean that they're better able to handle college work. Study after study shows that the high school record, the grades that you get, particularly in college prep courses, are a free. Longer predictor of academic success than any test can ever be. And if you think about it, it makes sense. High school grades reflect lots of tests that teachers give and all kinds of other work. And in addition to those Cognitive Academic factors, they reflect very important things such as self discipline, creativity, ability to work with others, and those kinds of non cognitive skills that are really necessary to succeed in college and in life. So high school record is a stronger predictor the research shows than the SAT or ACT, and that's a major reason why so many colleges now, more than 1000 have test optional policies for all or many applicants,


Ethan Sawyer  5:46  
right? What are I'm curious. What are some other things that people get wrong about standardized tests? What? Maybe bust some myths for us. What are some of your favorite myths? Yeah, go well.


Bob Schaeffer  5:57  
But you know, people, people believe it's the strongest predictor. People believed for many years because the test makers said so that the test can't be coached. Except in the last two years, both the manufacturer of the SATs, the College Board and act admitted that coaching works, and are now selling their own products, after castigating the test prep industry and people who said that it worked like fair tests, calling us liars, and now they say, whoops, sorry. 50 years of our statements were all wrong. Test Prep boost scores. And when you can buy, you know there are test prep specialists out there on the internet who charge 50, 100, 500 even $1,000 an hour for test prep assistance. And presumably there is that they're good, they can boost scores significantly.


Ethan Sawyer  6:47  
What do you feel like in terms of that notion that the SAT measures? You know what students need to know in college?


Bob Schaeffer  6:55  
Well, I went to college. My child went to college. I don't know how many multiple choice, choice, fast paced guessing game test you take in college. I don't recall any really, but that's what the SAT is. The SAT is a great measure of how well you take the SAT. And similarly, for the A, C, T, that's not the kind of work you do in college or real life, sitting in a large Testing Center and filling in bubbles for three and a half hours. It's a measure of a particular skill test taking, not academic quality. So and


Ethan Sawyer  7:29  
there's also the sense there that that colleges need this, they need test scores in order to make their admissions decisions. What's What's your thought on that?


Bob Schaeffer  7:36  
Well, it's called an existence proof. There are 1000 and three accredited bachelor degree college is about 40% of all four year schools in the country are now test optional or test flex, flexible for all or many applicants. Going back to, you know, very selective schools like Bowdoin, which was the first to go test optional in 1969 there's nearly 50 years of data showing that they can make as good or better decisions in terms of who to admit, what types of kids to admit, without relying on test scores. And there's now a ton of academic research which backs that up. Yeah.


Ethan Sawyer  8:18  
Talk to us about some of that. What are some of the studies that have come out and say the last few years on


Bob Schaeffer  8:23  
this? I mean, there have been a lot the I think the most widely focused upon study was done that was one, one that was published several years ago by the National Association for college admissions counseling, or NACAC, a place I know you and I speak at their major national conference. And the NACAC study, done by William histh, who is the former admissions director and vice president of Bates College, very selective school in Maine and another early adopter, looked at data from applicants to 33 schools, both liberal arts colleges and private and public universities, 124,000 student records, and found that kids who didn't submit test scores at those schools had academic records in college of essentially the same as those who did submit test scores. So those schools were making admissions decisions without regard to test scores, which were just as good as those with test scores, and at the same time, they were getting more diversity of all sorts, diversity in terms of race, geography, academic interests, etc, which schools, more and more today are trying to focus upon, to open doors of opportunity to student groups that are historically underrepresented.


Ethan Sawyer  9:48  
There's another Thank you. There's another study that we talked about when we were just sort of putting things together for this podcast where you mentioned this, this study of crossing the finish line. Will you say just words on that,


Bob Schaeffer  9:58  
crossing the finish line? Is a heavily academic book filled with statistics. It was done by the former president of Harvard and Princeton, and looked at what predicts best predicts graduation rate. And here are some of the conclusions. I'm going to read them to you. High school grades are a far better incremental predictor of graduation rates than our standard S, A, T, A, C, T scores overly heavy reliance on SAT AC, T scores and admitting students can have adverse effects on the diversity the student bodies enrolled, and most importantly, the strong predictive power of high school GPA holds even when we know little or nothing about the quality of the high school attended, and that's important because people defenders of the test say, well, schools vary in academic rigor. That's true. Teachers grading systems differ significantly. That's true. And yet researchers find, despite all those differences, high school grades predict better than the test, which shows how truly weak predictor the A, C, T and sat actually are. So


Ethan Sawyer  11:06  
I want to, I want to ask a clarifying question, and then I want to hear a little bit more about fair test and the work that fair test does. What? What is the difference between test optional and test flexible?


Bob Schaeffer  11:16  
Great question, and these are terms of art and Chronicle of Higher Education wrote about test optional as having 50 Shades of Gray to fair test. And I think we're the keepers of the list. Test optional means you can be admitted without submitting an ACT or SAT score period that you don't know other tests required. Test flexible is a policy about a dozen colleges in the country pursue, and that means, instead of submitting the SAT or ACT, you can choose to submit other test scores, SAT Subject Test, International Baccalaureate scores, advanced placement scores and the like, but they still require some form of standardized testing, just not necessarily the SAT or ACD to be test flexible in our definition.


Ethan Sawyer  12:13  
Tell me about fair test. How did it come to be and what kind of work does fair test do?


Bob Schaeffer  12:18  
Well, fair test was founded, actually in the mid 1980s by leaders of student advocacy, civil rights, women and education reform groups who came together at a conference and recognized that there was no single organization out there that focused on improving testing. All those groups had seen the way tests were a barrier to access an opportunity for many people, but it wasn't their major focus, so they encouraged the formation of a new organization, which became the National Center for fair and open testing and fair tests, very Early on, in like 1987 began looking at colleges who admit students without regard to test scores, we're fierce critics of what's wrong with standardized tests, but we know we have an obligation to promote better alternatives and test optional admissions. Admitting students without a CT or SAT is a far better alternative. What


Ethan Sawyer  13:21  
if you had to pick what's, what's your favorite resource on the fair test site? If you had to point students and counselors to something? Well,


Bob Schaeffer  13:28  
it's not my opinion that matters. What's most popular by far is the list of test optional schools, fair tests, slash University, slash optional, or at least from our main our home [email protected] on the upper right, just click on it. That page alone gets three to 400,000 unique visits a year from students, their teachers, parents, counselors and other athletes, looking at options, looking at alternatives to the conventional way of applying to college based on A, C, T and SAT scores.


Ethan Sawyer  14:05  
I want to I'm interested in why, in which type of students would potentially apply to these schools. But first, I want to ask, from the college's perspective, why do colleges, in your experience, decide to go test optional, and why are more and more deciding to do this?


Bob Schaeffer  14:21  
Well, I think you know, if you ask colleges, you get a variety of reasons, because higher education in the United States is a very diverse field, with schools that have different missions or schools that are religious traditions, and schools focused on specific technologies or performing arts, and those that are created to serve State University populations, but almost uniformly, they say that data, that hard evidence, are their own internal studies and those done by peer institutions show that you don't need the AC, T and sat to make fair and accurate. Admissions decisions, and they conclude that it serves as a hurdle for some kids, because the cost involved in the test taking and application process, it blocks some kids from applying who would otherwise up be able to apply, be admitted and do well and the college,


Ethan Sawyer  15:20  
yeah, tell me more about that. So which, which type of students do you feel like benefit from, from test optional schools and from applying test optional?


Bob Schaeffer  15:27  
Well, our position would be all students, but, and I think in particular, kids who have done very well in their high school curriculum get strong grades and have taken challenging courses and have built strong records of non academic work, either extracurriculars or community service or religious activities, or the jobs that they've held, but don't do so well on the test for whatever reason those kids, it's perfect test. Optional admissions is perfect for them because they can show their best characteristics and and not have to emphasize the number that makes them look less strong than they really are. But we've seen stories of talk to kids at every level who have just who hate testing, students who are going to college now and in 2018 have gone through public schools during the No Child Left Behind era. During that time, according to a study by the Council of Chief State School Officers, the typical high school graduate has taken 112 standardized tests. Wow. Teenagers are fed up. They don't want to take any tests, and many young people see a school with a test optional policy as saying we're going to look at you as more than a score. We're going to evaluate you holistically based on everything that you are and can do, not how well you filled in bubbles one Saturday morning. Yeah,


Ethan Sawyer  16:56  
I'm thinking of that, that quote from network that no student would know about, but the not going to take it anymore, right? But we've


Bob Schaeffer  17:04  
seen, you know, signs of demonstrations. We quoting network, which shows our age, but it's, it was a great movie nonetheless, right?


Ethan Sawyer  17:13  
So in terms of, you know, from the school's perspective, if a student isn't submitting standardized test scores, you know, what are they? What is students? What are the colleges tend to ask for from students if they're not submitting standardized test scores? And I know it varies, you know, school to school. But what are some, some things that, just to give students an idea who may or just be hearing about this for the first


Bob Schaeffer  17:31  
time, many schools, and we try and index their types, tries to indicate this on our web list with with notes, many schools don't require anything else, the high school record, the transcript, the teacher recommendations, the student essays, which are part of the regular admissions process, are more than sufficient to make good decisions. Some schools want to see more. For example, Worcester Polytechnic Institute, a top tier technical school, science and engineering school wants to see examples of projects on which he worked. Other places want to see written essays that she did in class that were graded by a teacher, your English teacher, for example, there's a variety of such requirements. Performing arts schools often want to have a presentation, a tryout, so they can see what you can do in the way of art or dance or music or whatever you're applying with. But to get test scores show none of that


Ethan Sawyer  18:36  
right. One of the things that, if I know that a student, if we've, if I've worked with them and talked with them and they are considering applying to test optional schools, I'll have them look up the, you know, what the school is asking for, what they might be looking for. For example, if it's going to be an English paper graded, and I say, you know, keep this in mind that you're going to be submitting this, you know. So it's advice to them to sort of like, hey, you know, work really hard in your English class if you know, if this is something that's going to be required as part of the application. So they can kind of do application, so they can kind of do double duty, as it were, what do you what is there any advice that you give to students who are, you know, thinking about this, this process, in terms of, you know, these additional requirements? I mean, certainly it sounds like doing the research would would be important. But is there anything else that comes to mind


Bob Schaeffer  19:17  
well, I mean, it is important that to look carefully at on the website for each college where you're thinking of applying to see what they require whether or not you're submitting test scores, because that varies greatly from school to school. In addition, you know, we encourage people to look at the list, and you will see that there are test optional colleges and universities of every type, from large state universities like Arizona State to, you know, tiny liberal arts campuses like Bard and everything in between, large public like Temple, large privates like Wake Forest. It and American University in George Washington. Once you've honed in on the type of school you want to go to the geographic region, then take a look at the test optional schools and see how they fit your needs.


Ethan Sawyer  20:17  
What impact does test optional have, if any, on financial aid, on scholarships, Merit aid, that sort of thing.


Bob Schaeffer  20:23  
That's a great question, and pretty much everything in college admissions. The answer is, it depends. Fair test encourages schools with drop test scores for admission to also drop them from financial aid. We recognize that the reality for many families now is not getting is that the most important thing is not getting into school, but getting enough money to pay for school, and that same test score hurdle set up only for financial aid ends up screening out low income kids and first generation kids, just as much as it would do if it were used only for admissions. The unfortunate reality is that many scholarship programs are based on endowments and historic grants and required test scores. So you have to look many schools, test optional schools will have lots of test optional money and some additional money that is based on that we have a test score requirement of some sort or another, particularly true at public universities, where often state politicians who are infatuated with test scores have created testing hurdles in order to get Get scholarship aid


Ethan Sawyer  21:39  
right. Sometimes students will be, you know, they'll see that test optional thing, and they'll maybe think it's a trick, like, well, they're saying that I don't have to do it, but it's kind of like those optional essays, like they're expecting me to submit one. Anyway, what do you say to students who you know are sort of suspicious that you know by they might be hurting themselves by not submitting a standardized test score?


Bob Schaeffer  22:01  
Well, look at the results from schools. I mean, there are schools like Pitts in California where more than half of the class did not submit test scores. So clearly, they're admitting folks like that. And More typically, schools will have between 30 and 40% of their admits were came in by the test optional route, and the percentage admits test optional and with test scores, it's quite similar. Gotcha? Another one. I guess there's no evidence that it hurts. And you know for certain kids, the kids you know, with great, great track records and weaker test scores, it absolutely helps.


Ethan Sawyer  22:42  
That's interesting. Say that again, because I want to make sure that the students that everybody got that will you repeat


Bob Schaeffer  22:47  
that last point, as I said earlier, you have kids who have strong academic records, both high school grades, particularly in college prep classes, and strong records of extracurricular, community service, religious organizations work, etc, whose test scores are not as strong as their academic record, are the perfect group for whom test optional help interesting.


Ethan Sawyer  23:13  
I just want to make sure people another question I get is from students, when they're considering this option, they've got kind of what they would consider to be a quote, unquote, just okay, test score. And I'm not gonna, you know, say what number that is, but it's like, you know, somebody who's kind of self conscious about their score for a particular school, you know, so they've got a number that they feel like falls kind of, they're like, they're just like, I don't know, what do you say to those kids? So they do you and of course, it depends, right? But you know, does it What advice do you give to those students? Well, we say,


Bob Schaeffer  23:43  
look at the data that the college provides on its own website or in various guide books, this guide or the College Board's handbook, or Barron's or something like that, where they will give you the mid 50% range of test scores if you're at the higher end of that range, submitting your test scores aren't going to hurt you if you're at the lower end or below the mid 50th percentile, it makes sense to apply test optional presuming the rest of your record is strong,


Ethan Sawyer  24:19  
right? One school that I love that I just want to give a shout out to that does a really good job of this is DePaul, where they basically say, hey, for those of you who are wondering, and it's on their test optional FAQs page, I'll link to all this in the show notes, of course, but you'll see on their test optional FAQ page that's like, here are our numbers, and you know, here's where you how you stack up. So you might have to do a little digging. I'm talking to the student now in order to find this but, but you can find out this information, and then hopefully, with the advice of a counselor, you can, you know, make an educated decision about this. DePaul


Bob Schaeffer  24:50  
has been a great model for test optional admission, not only the process by which they researched and made the decision, DePaul taking large but. Private university with an urban orientation in the city of Chicago, but its leaders have done a great job of reaching out to their peers in college admission, speaking at conferences, sometimes on panels with me, to promote the notion of test optional admission. And they're, you know, they're, very strong critics of what happens when you raise you rely too much on test scores. You end up limiting who enters to those kids who've had every opportunity in life already.


Ethan Sawyer  25:33  
Right on to Paul's side, I noticed that there are two groups of students who sometimes listen to this podcast, homeschooled students and international students who aren't able to apply to test optional. What if a student's in one of those groups and and you know that student doesn't test well, what advice would you give them?


Bob Schaeffer  25:50  
You know, excellent point. And we say explicitly on the top of the fair test optional list on fairtest.org that this is a list of schools that are test optional for recent graduates of us High School, many schools that are test optional for all those kids without any extra provisions, still want to see test scores from home schooled kids because they don't have conventional report cards, they haven't taken conventional subjects, and they want some form of quantitative evidence to know what the level of preparation is in terms of international applicants, it's much the same thing that you don't know the quality of the school from overseas, and you don't know what the grades mean, necessarily. So there's a wide variety of policies, and we have a link on our website to a list of institutions which are test optional for international applicants as well.


Ethan Sawyer  26:47  
Great the the list of test optional schools. I just want to flag this for the reader is going to be or the listener is going to be, well, the reader, when you, when you read the show notes, is going to be on the the site for this. And also, I want to point you to fair test.org because that's where you'll find a bunch of other resources. Just give us a sense real quick. Of first of all, I'm curious. Well actually, let's get practical for a second. What if a student decides Bob that they are looking at test optional schools? What advice do you give them in terms of the search process? Because I can imagine, if I were a student looking at that list of 1000 schools, I might feel a little overwhelmed, right? What advice do you give them? Well,


Bob Schaeffer  27:23  
you can sort our list geographically by clicking on state that helps narrow it down. There are a couple sub lists that you can click on. All this is free. On our website, you can go to a list of a top tier schools that are with test optional policies. We know many kids are looking at schools that are nationally ranked, and we have on the side of list of just over 300 schools that are rated in the top category by us. News and World Report's rankings not necessarily the world's best tool, but the website will help point you at those kinds of schools. So it is. It's sortable in a few ways that will help you look


Ethan Sawyer  28:06  
that's great. I want to also, I want to also put in a bid for the how to create a great college list, you know, podcast that I recorded that could help for students who are listening and haven't heard that podcast could help you sort of figure out what you're looking for. And then you go to fair test and check out the list and see which ones


Bob Schaeffer  28:24  
I just received. One of the more popular college going books, the fifth Guide to Colleges, 2018 edition today, which lists about 300 506 colleges that he viewed, that they view as the best types of schools around the country, and they remark in the introduction that, in fact, about 105 of those schools are test optional, so even a third of the schools on the fifth best colleges list fall into the test optional or test flexible.


Ethan Sawyer  28:55  
Wow, that's great. I didn't know that actually,


Bob Schaeffer  28:57  
yeah. I mean, it's interesting. I was just reading it the other day. They'd say that, for the first time, there is a critical mass of test optional schools. And if you want to get out of the testing rat race, here's the way you can do it and still go to colleges that meet your other needs.


Ethan Sawyer  29:15  
Wow, that's great. And I'm flagging another podcast if you're if you have no idea what the FISC guide is, there's another podcast that I did with Ted Fisk where he talks about, you know, how the guide came to be. It's kind of a fun one. So I just want to know, Are there anything, is there anything else on the, particularly on the fair test website, that you want to flag for, either counselors who are listening or or colleges who are potentially interested in this, you know, this whole test optional thing, is there anything that you would point them towards? Well,


Bob Schaeffer  29:42  
there are a number of fact sheets. If you click on university admissions on the top bar, it'll direct you to a bunch of fact sheets that provide evidence for a number of things that we've talked about today, from the strong relationship between test scores and family income on both the SAP and. ACP, as family income goes up, average test scores go up to fact sheets about what's wrong with the SAT and ACT to the summaries of some of the research from books like crossing the finish line or defining promise or Mac act report we talked about at the beginning that looks at 124,000 kids at 33 colleges. That's all there on the website.


Ethan Sawyer  30:27  
That's beautiful. Tell me this. I'm going to ask you to as we start to wrap up your personal question, Bob. And the question is, why does this matter so much to


Bob Schaeffer  30:38  
you? That's a good question. I've always been a great test taker, getting high scores easily and viewing that as a game. And after my undergraduate years, I worked at the Education Research Center at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where I went to school with it and a previous generation of test critics who helped me understand that the tests were largely meaningless devices that assess how well you could take tests and not much else and over the working there the Education Research Center, We worked with students from a number of other institutions like tufts College, like a local community college, like the Detroit Institute of Technology, who did not have super high test scores, many of whom were extremely talented young people, and it provided evidence that test scores don't measure merit. They measure a particular skill which is not the same as what you need to do well in college, in life, and as the intervening years, I've seen lots of evidence that the test score requirement serves as a barrier to access to the kinds of people that this nation is going to need to open doors to as we move forward. And that's first generation kids, kids whose home language is not English, older kids, etc. In fact, that's one thing we didn't talk about. I think it's important to say, Please I mentioned that our list is a list of schools that are test optional for applicants just out of high school. The reality is that almost all colleges in the country are test optional if you applying as an older adult. And there was a study released just the other day that showed about half the kids in college now are not teenagers, but in their 20s or older. It's also true that tests are not required at any of the fat or a CT is not required at any of the two year schools in the country, and many of them have great articulation programs, so you go to a community college, a junior college for two years, no test required. You do well there, and you're essentially automatically admitted at a four year school as a transfer student, without regard to test scores. So there are other ways to get in. We don't call it Test optional, but they really are test optional,


Ethan Sawyer  33:19  
right? As the I'm big on values, and the some of the values that I'm hearing, as you're talking about this Bob, our commitment to access equality is one that I'm hearing, playing field, fairness, that one's in the title, right? And what else are there any that I'm missing in there? I'm just, this is sort of like getting into to you, like, what's this really about for you? So I'm even, I'm actually asking a second one to go, like, Why does, why do these things matter to you so much?


Bob Schaeffer  33:50  
Well, you know, because it gives kids a chance. I often use, like a baseball metaphor. It's spring training time now that what test optional admissions does is it allows students who've done well in the minor leagues in, quote, of high school, a chance for a shot at the next level. They don't You don't have to take a test. It's your performance in in the minors. It gives you a shot at the majors. And with test optional admissions, it's your performance in high school and in your extracurricular, non academic life that gives you the opportunity to move up to the next level and show your stuff. It's very performance based. It's not just based on the ability to play the multiple choice guessing game. Beautiful. Okay,


Ethan Sawyer  34:39  
last question, what do you say to students who are applying to schools that require the SAT and ACT? What advice do you give to them if they are going to go ahead and do test prep, say or take standardized tests?


Bob Schaeffer  34:52  
Well, we give the same advice to kids whether they're applying to test optional or test required schools, which is to take practice for. Versions of the SAT or ACT. There are free books, cost books, available that you take the test at home. See how you're going to see your score on the test, if your score is within the range of the colleges where you're planning to apply, or if those schools are test optional, don't do any test prep, get on with your life, build a strong academic record, do stuff in your community and after school. Those are the factors that will really matter in the admissions process. If you're aiming at a school where your scores are not high enough and they're not test optional, then and only then, consider the test prep that best matches your learning style and your parents pocket.


Ethan Sawyer  35:45  
Great advice. Bob, thank you. Thank you for the work that you do in this world, and I appreciate having you on the podcast.


Bob Schaeffer  35:51  
Thank you for the opportunity again. Ethan,


Ethan Sawyer  35:57  
Hey friends, that's the podcast episode. You can find all the notes as ever at college essay guy.com/podcast the Bob Schaffer episode has all of the links that we talked about. Are you following College Essay Guy on the Twitter machine or the Facebook or the Instagram or the Pinterest? Because College Essay Guy is on all those things. Hope to connect with you all out there, or IRL be well, and as always, stay curious. You.


Transcribed by https://otter.ai