This is not entirely true. SAT scores can be used as ways to admit more privileged students, as they tend to have access to more test prep along with privileges such as extra time:
> In 2010 three College Board researchers analyzed data from more than 150,000 students who took the SAT, and they found that the demographics of the two “discrepant” groups differed substantially. The students with the inflated SAT scores were more likely to be white or Asian than the students in the deflated-SAT group, and they were much more likely to be male. Their families were also much better off. Compared with the students with the deflated SAT scores, the inflated-SAT students were more than twice as likely to have parents who earned more than $100,000 a year and more than twice as likely to have parents with graduate degrees. These were the students — the only students — who were getting an advantage in admissions from the SAT. And they were exactly the kind of students that Trinity was admitting in such large numbers in the years before Pérez arrived.
> By contrast, according to the College Board’s demographic analysis, students in the deflated-SAT group, the ones whose SAT scores were significantly lower than their high school grades would have predicted, were twice as likely to be black as students in the inflated-SAT group, nearly twice as likely to be female and almost three times as likely to be Hispanic. They were three times as likely as students in the inflated-SAT group to have parents who earned less than $30,000 a year, and they were almost three times as likely to have parents who hadn’t attended college. They were the students — the only students — whose college chances suffered when admissions offices considered the SAT in addition to high school grades.
The article goes on to explain that while grade point average is relatively consistent across income level, SAT scores are skewed towards the rich. Schools have realized this, which is why many schools no longer require the SAT or ACT.
Does that study control for school quality? If grades are normalized for a local school population, then good grades at one school can be worse than mediocre grades at another school.
This was exactly the purpose for which tests like the SAT were created. If that factor wasn’t controlled for, then the quote above is misleading.
While I've heard that said, I've never seen proof that grades are inflated at poor schools. I wouldn't be surprised if it wasn't actually the opposite, as helicopter parents and their ambitious students are more able (more free time) to self-promote and argue their way into higher grades.
Grades are more inflated at rich school. The presure teachers are under is great. For private school, if parents can get better grades elsewhere they will move them.
The material may be easier in a poor school and an average student can seem amazing compared to a below average student.
The rich dumb, poor smart both come in from behind the eightball. Rich can buy there way out and poor can work there way in. If I'm mit I want rich smart.. seems less risky.
> In 2010 three College Board researchers analyzed data from more than 150,000 students who took the SAT, and they found that the demographics of the two “discrepant” groups differed substantially. The students with the inflated SAT scores were more likely to be white or Asian than the students in the deflated-SAT group, and they were much more likely to be male. Their families were also much better off. Compared with the students with the deflated SAT scores, the inflated-SAT students were more than twice as likely to have parents who earned more than $100,000 a year and more than twice as likely to have parents with graduate degrees. These were the students — the only students — who were getting an advantage in admissions from the SAT. And they were exactly the kind of students that Trinity was admitting in such large numbers in the years before Pérez arrived.
> By contrast, according to the College Board’s demographic analysis, students in the deflated-SAT group, the ones whose SAT scores were significantly lower than their high school grades would have predicted, were twice as likely to be black as students in the inflated-SAT group, nearly twice as likely to be female and almost three times as likely to be Hispanic. They were three times as likely as students in the inflated-SAT group to have parents who earned less than $30,000 a year, and they were almost three times as likely to have parents who hadn’t attended college. They were the students — the only students — whose college chances suffered when admissions offices considered the SAT in addition to high school grades.
Source: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/09/10/magazine/coll...
The article goes on to explain that while grade point average is relatively consistent across income level, SAT scores are skewed towards the rich. Schools have realized this, which is why many schools no longer require the SAT or ACT.