Admissions

[Fred_Nickols3]

[Fred Nickols (971219.1645 EST)]

Bruce Nevin (971218.1745)

Your objection to Mark's coin flip comparison trips over this ambiguity, I
think. The .5 correlation is over a population. The coin flip is one
individual at a time. "Sam's GPA will correlate with his IQ, yes or no."
(Flip) "Gail's GPA will correlate with her IQ, yes or no." (Flip). Half the
time you're right. Tough luck on the smart kid frozen out of a scholarship
because the application of statistical measures to individuals tipped the
balance on the record. But helpful to admissions officials and aid
officials who need a winnowing sieve, and wouldn't be caught dead flipping
a coin.

Bruce:

Fred Nickols here. As you might know, I work at ETS (Educational Testing
Service), although I am not a psychologist, a statistician, or a
psychometrician.

Can you say some more about how statistical measures are misused in the
admissions process? I'm especially interested in the remark about the smart
kid frozen out of a scholarship "because the application of statistical
measures to individuals tipped the balance on the record." Where and how
does this happen? Does Phil Runkel's book speak to this issue, in
particular, to admissions?

Regards,

Fred Nickols
nickols@worldnet.att.net

[bnhpct]

Fred Nickols here.

Hi, Fred.

As you might know, I work at ETS (Educational Testing
Service), although I am not a psychologist, a statistician, or a
psychometrician.

I didn't know. I haven't had the bandwidth to follow more than a fraction
of CSG traffic for the past couple of years.

Can you say some more about how statistical measures are misused in the
admissions process? I'm especially interested in the remark about the smart
kid frozen out of a scholarship "because the application of statistical
measures to individuals tipped the balance on the record." Where and how
does this happen?

Supposition based on

o My experience of people who have been shunted to a lower track or denied
admission because of test scores, including IQ, being taken as predicters
of academic performance. They were told that this was the reason.

o My experience of the winnowing process in screening resumes of candidates
in a hiring process. When you're in that seat, the felt need for an
"objective" mechanism to narrow down the field can get pretty strong.

o My judgement that the correlation of IQ with GPA is very likely to be
taken as a predicter of academic performance and used to screen
applications for admissions to academic programs. Until other means are
found to scratch this itch, misapplication of population measures to
individuals will continue in these contexts. An opportunity for you, perhaps?

o My perception that IQ is a measure based on population observations, and
that it is routinely applied to individuals. GPA on the face of it is a
summation of teachers' judgements of an individual student's performance,
but grading is commonly done "on the curve," that is, a bell curve
distribution is assumed and grades for a class are more or less made to fit
that expectation. To that extent, GPA is distorted by application of
population measures to individuals.

Does Phil Runkel's book speak to this issue, in
particular, to admissions?

It might. Or you could ask him directly. I haven't yet read Phil Runkel's
book. I am in process of getting a copy -- a relative asked what I wanted
for Christmas.

I should say that I wrote that message before seeing and thinking about
Bill's "can we talk about PCT now?" note. Because of a problem with my
mailer, it didn't go out. But later, my reply to Bill did. Today I found
the message we are now talking about lurking in my outbox and sent it
without remembering (or reconsidering) its contents. There's a certain
irony in the timing, isn't there?

  Bruce