Foreign applicants to American universities must submit scores on standardized tests of their English skills.
The more nonsubmitters, the higher the average (in the first few years, Mr. Epstein reports, 25percentto40percentcent of applicants don't submit scores).
Colleges that allows applicants to submit scores from any of these tests, rather than just the SAT, aren't sacrificing anything.
Most colleges seem to be leaning toward allowing that transition group, the graduating class of 2006, to submit scores either from the old SAT or the new SAT, and, if an applicant submits both, to consider the highest one.
He says he has watched the reported average test scores of peer institutions increase in recent years because the colleges aren't plugging in the results of freshmen who don't submit scores.
Several colleges and universities that no longer require applicants to submit scores say they now attract an academically capable and more interesting student body, with more minorities and more foreign students.
That means 30,000 students, or 2percentt of the 1.3 million high school seniors who sit for the College Boards each year, will submit scores to colleges as if they had been tested under the same conditions as everyone else.
As the officials recounted, after Mr. Geithner ended his oral testimony, members of the Senate Finance Committee had submitted scores of questions that had to be answered before the panel's vote on his nomination the next morning.
Under his proposal, the university would drop the requirement that applicants submit scores from the SAT I, an aptitude test, but continue to require the so-called SAT II, which tests students in subject areas, including English, math, history, science and foreign languages.
