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MIT's SAT Math Error

Posted by Zonk on from the maybe-they-should-get-a-college-graduate-to-check-it dept.

theodp writes "The Wall Street Journal reports that for years now, MIT wasn't properly calculating the average freshmen SAT scores (reg.) used to determine U.S. News & World Report's influential annual rankings. In response to an inquiry made by The Tech regarding the school's recent drop in the rankings, MIT revealed that in past years it had excluded the test scores of foreign students as well as those who fared better on the ACT than the SAT, both violations of the U.S. News rules. MIT's reported first-quartile SAT verbal and math scores for the 2006 incoming class totaled 1380, a drop of 50 points from 2005."

3 of 280 comments (clear)

  1. 1220 in 1989 by Saint+Stephen · · Score: 5, Informative

    You can't compare any scores because it's all been rebased to be meaningless.

    Back then, a 1400 really meant something, and a "perfect" score was a one or two person thing.

    1. Re:1220 in 1989 by JoelKatz · · Score: 5, Informative

      That's correct, the scores are normalized so that the distributions are the same. This means you *can't* compare scores across years. If you did, you would find that, amazingly, the distributions were the same. But have the students stayed the same? Nope. Have the questions stayed the same? No again.

      If you google around, you'll see articles about how "national SAT scores fell for the second year in a row" or some nonsense like that. There are ways you can sensibly compare SAT scores across years, but you cannot compare averages over a significant fraction of the testing pool.

  2. Re:If I could do it all over again... by allacds · · Score: 5, Informative

    I think that anyone who wants an engineering degree for the money will be disappointed. I have a degree in chemical engineering, and I make $55,000 (that is with 10 months of experience). That sounds like a lot for being just out of school, but given the extra effort of obtaining the degree, and the amount of work that is expected from me at my job, I don't think it's a better deal than a liberal arts degree would've been. I think that the value of any degree is what you do with it. If you work to gain valuable experience, advocate yourself, and work well with others, you can make a 6 figure income with any degree.


    Yes but consider this. The average starting salary of a liberal arts degree holder is generally quoted as $30-35k. The average starting salary of an engineering degree holder is generally quoted in the $50-55k range. That's a pretty significant difference - the engineering degree yields a return of 40 to 80% straight off the bat. Granted the engineering degree is harder but I'd say it's well worth the effort.

    Now that said, I do agree with you that a degree is only as valuable as you make it (to a certain point). But I think taking these numbers in the aggregate probably cuts a lot of the variance due to super high- and low- achievers.