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Many colleges and universities have gone test optional in college admissions amid the coronavirus crisis, which also is wreaking havoc with large numbers of high school transcripts.
That combination likely means admissions staff members at selective colleges will have "extraordinary discretion" in making decisions about whom to admit, writes Rick Hess,
"Unleashed from the discipline imposed by an applicant’s grades, test scores and demonstrated accomplishment, college officials and admissions staff may be tempted to favor applicants with deep-pocketed parents, those who reflect their own personal or political biases, and those able to assemble a compelling file even when the world is in pieces (read: the privileged and connected)," he wrote in Forbes.
Hess called for an unprecedented experiment to try to level the playing field in admissions: a lottery-style process where applicants need only have a high school diploma or equivalent. It's not the first time Hess has proposed such a solution, which also has been suggested by New America.
"College admissions are a complicated, fraught challenge in the best of times. And these are not the best of times," wrote Hess. "If colleges are going to struggle to judge students fairly, in any event, it just may be time to try another approach to admissions -- and to make a virtue out of necessity."
