Gender Bias in the College Predictions of the SAT

Summary
This article, Gender Bias in the College Predictions of the SAT, discusses how the
predictions made by colleges, in this case UC Berkeley, based off student SAT scores
under-represents women. The article claims that the tests used are biased towards
male dominated fields and that if the tests were corrected and made more unbiased,
there would be a larger percentage of women students in the student population. The
article claims the test does not accurately display a predicted college gpa or how
women would do in college course. The article continues on by saying that even though
the difference in predicted grades is not huge, if the problem was solved, there would be
nearly 5% more women admitted into the freshman class each year. Along with being
under-represented in the population, the article also brings up that, because they are
better students than the test predicts, they are also being under-represented when it
comes to merit based scholarship opportunities and applying to other universities that
are very selective. One part of the research done in this article looks at the gender
influences on the courses they choose. It states that women could be admitted on a
harder scale because they study subjects that may be graded more leniently than those
taken by men, therefore making it appear that women generally make better grades
than men. For instance, men make up a much larger portion of STEM courses and
these courses are graded harder. Therefore, the predictions for male gpas are going to
be lower than that of a females. Altering the mix of test questions in order to correct the
bias or expanding the number of womens applications that are evaluated were some of
the solutions suggested to cure this problem.

Summary 2.0 (Shortened)

This article discusses how the predictions made by colleges, in this case UC Berkeley,
based off student SAT scores under-represents women. It states that this test doesnt
accurately display a predicted college gpa or how women would do in college courses
because of the bias towards more male dominated fields. It states that women could be
admitted on a harder scale because they study subjects that may be graded more
leniently than those taken by men, therefore making it appear that women generally
make better grades than men. For instance, men make up a much larger portion of
STEM courses and these courses are graded harder. Therefore, the predictions for
male gpas are going to be lower than that of a females. Altering test questions in order
to correct the bias or expanding the number of womens applications that are evaluated
were some of the solutions suggested to cure this problem. If the bias was accounted
for, there would be nearly 5% more women admitted into the freshman class each year.

Rhetorical Analysis
This article was written by two men who state they are as close to an unbiased set of
observers as this problem is likely to get. These men, David K. Leonard and Jiming
Jiang, published this paper April 21, 1995. David Leonard was the Dean of International
and Area Studies at UC Berkeley, and Jiming Jiang was a PhD student at UC Berkeley
in 1995. This shows the problem of gender bias was known 21 years ago, and prevalent
enough for men to feel the need to publish a paper on it. The article itself was published
and presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Educational Research Association
in San Francisco, CA. With this in mind, the article was most likely intended for
members attending the meeting, and who likely were high-up in the education system.
The purpose for constructing a research paper/article like this was most likely to get
people to begin to realize that these small changes needed to be made so that women
can have just as equal chance at getting into the university as their male counterparts.
The context of this paper includes graphs, tables, and an abstract. This context, paired
with the body part of the text, fits the conventions of a normal research paper. With this
being said, I believe the genre of this article to be academic/ research paper. This paper
may not cover the same exact issues we have in todays society, but to have begun
noticing gender bias against women 21 years ago is pretty astonishing.

Reference List
Leonard, David K., and Jiming Jiang. 1995. "Gender Bias in the College Predictions of
the SAT." ERIC, EBSCOhost (accessed March 29, 2017).