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Gre Scores As Predictors Of Minority Students' Success In Graduate Study: An Argument For Change - Statistical Data Included
College Student Journal, June, 2001 by Charles Sampson, Patricia G. Boyer
Minority access to graduate education has captured the concern of admissions officers, professors, and administrators over the last two decades. Central to the issue is whether standard entry prerequisites are accurate predictors of whether an applicant can successfully complete the requirements for, and subsequently earn a graduate degree.
The present study sought to determine, "How accurate have the GRE scores and select demographic variables been in predicting the first year graduate work among minority students at a `Research I' institution?" Descriptive statistics, correlation, and multiple regression were utilized to statistically analyze these data. Due to the findings of this study, it suggests the necessity of focusing on other factors besides the usual criteria when admitting minority students to graduate programs.
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Minority students' access to graduate education is an issue that has captured the concern of admissions officers, professors and administrators over the last two decades. Central to the issue is which entry prerequisites are meaningful or accurate in predicting whether an applicant can successfully complete the requirements for, and subsequently earn a graduate degree. The most widely examined portions of an applicant's dossier are the undergraduate transcript, an applicant's personally written statement, letters of support provided from faculty familiar with the applicant, and performance on standardized examinations such as the Graduate Record Examination (GRE). In a limited number of instances, personal interviews with the applicant are also used.
None of these means unilaterally constitutes a defensible basis for making an admissions decision. Undergraduate transcripts reflect differential-grading standards practiced at individual institutions, personal statements are subjective and cannot determine the actual potential of the applicant and likewise, faculty letters of reference are subjective. The standardized, nationally normed examination is the most objective. However, its usefulness in predicting minority students' success in graduate education has not been established without equivocation.
Early Pathos of the Graduate Record Examination (GRE)
The ETS' own data sources (Grandy, 1994) indicate that GRE General Test Scores were "slightly to moderately predictive" of the graduate students' first year grade point average. Moreover, proponents of the GRE state that its scores do not consist of all the important variables in predicting an individual's success in a graduate program. A twenty-year longitudinal study reported that undergraduate grades were assumed to be inflated and less trustworthy than the standardized test (Willingham, 1974). Moreover, the issue of whether competence or aptitude was the more valuable factor in admissions decisions was also debated (Hodgkinson, Hurst and Levine, 1975).
In addition to these emerging views on the viability of the GRE vis-a-vis undergraduate grades, a variety of methodological and conceptual problems have been cited and they tend to reflect serious difficulty in demonstrating the validity of entrance examinations as a predictor of graduate school success (Sanders and Perfetto, 1992; Oldfield, 1994). Additionally, Morrison and Morrison (1995) conducted a recta-analytic review on published studies examining the relationship between performance on the quantitative and verbal components of the GRE and grade point average (GPA). The weighted average effect for the quantitative and verbal were .445 and .591 respectively, and their resultant correlation coefficients were .22 (GRE-Q and GPA) and .28 (GRE-V and GPA). Thus an average of 6% of the variance in graduate level academic performance as represented by GPA was accounted for by performance on GRE-V. These same researchers, (Morrison and Morrison) focused on thirty studies that examined the predictive validity of the GRE-Q. Twenty-two of these studies used GPA as their criterion for success. These results suggest the GRE-Q and GRE-V components of the GRE pose minimal predictive validity.
Onasch (1994) sought to determine the usefulness of the undergraduate GPA and GRE scores as predictors of the time it takes to complete a masters of science degree. That research concluded that students with higher undergraduate degrees took less time to graduate than students with lower undergraduate GPA's. It also found that higher GRE scores predicted a longer time to graduation and that age and undergraduate GPA's were inversely related. House (1989), Kaczmarek and Franco (1986) and Scheuneman (1987) reported that age, gender, and race impact GRE performance. Most important, Educational Testing Service (ETS) discontinued the edition of the GRE General Test that included verbal, quantitative and analytical sections, and developed major alterations. It was replaced in 1999 with a General Test that attempts to measure verbal, quantitative, analytical and writing skills. Educational Testing Services (ETS) introduced these changes at least in part because there was uncertainty about the viability of the GRE as an instrument to predict "success" in graduate study. Moreover, observations of this writer and other colleagues who dealt first hand with minority graduate students and their efforts to gain admission to select programs produced much anecdotal testimony about those students who would be classified as "false negatives," i.e., those who earned sufficient undergraduate grades but whose GRE scores were not sufficient to gain admission to especially `Research I' universities. In those instances where admission was granted, those "false negatives" were successful in completing a graduate degree. Because of these unintended successes, there are continuing questions as to whether the GRE constitutes a valid basis for selecting prospective minority graduate students. This, then, is an opportune time to critically reflect upon the GRE and its utility in assisting the graduate admissions process for minority students.
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