Tests may give insight for college.

Byline: Greg Bolt The Register-Guard

A new study suggests that the state tests given in the 10th grade offer high school students a way to gauge their preparation for college much earlier than other tests, giving them more time to shore up any weaknesses.

The study by the Oregon University System shows that students who do well on 10th-grade assessments in reading, writing, math and math problem-solving also do well in those subjects in their freshman year of college. Before the state started giving the standardized tests, also known as benchmarks, students wouldn't know where they stood until they took the SAT, usually in their senior year but sometimes as a junior.

That gave students little or no time to make significant improvements in their grades or class schedule before beginning the college application process.

"What we think the study clearly points to is the benchmarks provide an opportunity to make adjustments," said Christine Tell, coordinator of the Proficiency-based Admissions Standards System at OUS. "What this means is if I'm not on track at the 10th grade, I still have time."

Tell will present a report on the study to a legislative committee in Salem on Monday. The study also indicates that the 10th-grade assessments are almost as good at the SAT in predicting how well students will do in their first year of college.

But Tell and David McDonald, director of enrollment services for OUS, acknowledged that it's too early to know for sure whether the tests are an accurate way to predict college success. While the results are promising, they said, the study looked only at the freshman class entering state universities and community colleges in 2001, the first to have taken the state tests as high school sophomores.

"This is baseline," Tell said. "We do need more years of data."

Critics of the state education reforms that led to testing have charged that the assessments put too much emphasis on knowledge that will be of little use to students when they enter the job market or go to college. Although the study only looked at the first students to go all the way through school under the reforms, McDonald said it indicates the whole string of tests line up with college requirements.

"We're still at a very, very early stage, but all indications are that it is a very promising program," he said. "From a higher education perspective, what K-12 has done looks real good."

But what's more exciting to college admissions officers is that the 10th-grade tests seem to offer students a much earlier look at where they're at on the road to college. Instead of waiting until taking the SAT, they can use the sophomore tests to figure out where they need more work to meet admission requirements.

Martha Pitts, admissions director at the UO, said that's more interesting than whether the tests are as good as the SAT in predicting college success, especially since the SAT is widely considered to be a poor tool for predicting college performance.

"The real value right now is that teachers and counselors at the 10th-grade level can see which students need more preparation," she said. "It offers earlier input on where students are."

Although applicants to the UO and most other state universities must submit results from an SAT or ACT test, Pitts said that's the least important factor in admission decisions.

Much more important are the difficulty of the classes students take in high school and their grades.

The UO has raised its admission standards to require a 3.25 GPA and 16 units in five core subject areas: math, English, social science, science and foreign language. Students who don't meet the standards can be admitted by going through a comprehensive review, which may include writing an essay as well as consideration of SAT scores.

Besides acting as an early progress report for college-bound students, McDonald said the 10th-grade tests also can provide encouragement for students who think college is out of reach. Many students, particularly those whose parents never went to college, don't realize how close they are to qualifying for admission.

"For that whole group of folks who haven't actually considered college, what a great way of telling them they're on track and capable of succeeding," McDonald said.