Why Do Students Get Paid?

823 Words2 Pages

After four long, strenuous years of hours upon hours of homework, late night studying, and emotional breakdowns, it all leads up to one thing: college. High schoolers spend their teen years working towards “perfect” GPA and build up their extracurriculars to create an impeccable application. So why, after devoting all those months of hard work, would students have to put even more into the journey to college? Have they not proven enough? According to The College Board, students have not. In order to be a considerable candidate, students need to take another standardized test: either the infamous ACT or SAT. Students pay hundreds of dollars in fees, tutors, and books to get an “acceptable” score, but these scores are increasingly becoming …show more content…

Students are not the only ones who realize the ridiculousness of this situation. According to Washington Monthly, even Yale University’s Executive Director of Association of Alumni, Jeffrey Brenzel agrees. Aside from striving to create the most diverse and elite student body, Brenzel realized that, “He was missing the most brilliant, interesting, and multidimensional students who happened to fall just short of the threshold SAT.” College applications focus on several different aspects of the student’s high school experience including: GPA, course load/difficulty, extracurricular activities, and “uniqueness.” Although Yale does require some form of standardized test, they have redesigned their entire admissions process. However, countless schools have taken a completely different route, because of “the dissatisfaction with standardized tests” (Matthew 1) and have become test optional. Test optional means that students can choose whether or not to submit their scores. Choosing to not submit their scores may exclude applicants from certain scholarship opportunities, but still helps those who have trouble testing or have trouble with receiving scores that don’t reflect their academic

Open Document