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New Tufts admissions
process draws from Sternberg’s research
(October
2006 Issue)
Colleges and universities across the country will be watching Tufts
University's new admissions procedure very closely this year. In
a move designed to bring a more scientific process to admissions
decisions, Tufts has updated its standard application to include
a new essay section. The questions, optional this first experimental
year of the program, are designed to test a student's practical
and creative abilities, skills believed to be necessary for later
success.
The pilot program, one of the first of its kind, draws from the
research of Tuft's new Dean of Arts and Sciences Robert J. Sternberg,
Ph.D., who developed a test to predict the academic success of incoming
college students.
New England Psychologist's Catherine Robertson-Souter spoke
with Sternberg about the new essay questions and the role psychology
can and should play in education.
A past-president of the American Psychological Association (APA),
Sternberg has served on the boards of directors of the APA, APA
Insurance Trust, American Psychological Foundation and Eastern Psychological
Association.
Q: What will be your role in the new admissions process?
A: My role is advisory only. Admissions is handled by Dean of Undergraduate
Admissions Lee Coffin and his staff. One of the first things I discovered
as Dean of the School of Arts and Sciences was the same thing I
discovered as president of the APA: One has little power outside
one's power to persuade people of the value of one's ideas; one
cannot merely impose ideas because one likes them!
Q: But you had input with the essay questions?
A: The changes are based on my WICS (wisdom-intelligence-creativity-synthesized)
theory of leadership.
The basic idea is that leaders need a synthesis of creative skills
and attitudes to generate new ideas; analytical skills and attitudes
to determine whether their (and others') ideas are good ones; practical
skills and attitudes to execute their ideas and persuade others
of their value; and wisdom-related skills and attitudes to ensure
that the ideas are for the common good. The theory is an extension
of my earlier triarchic theory of successful intelligence.
The questions assess the skills in the WICS theory of leadership.
For example, questions might be ones like writing a creative essay
on "the end of MTV," an analytical one evaluating why one would
like to have a particular book on one's bookshelf, a practical one
on how one would handle a problem with roommates regarding space
allocation in a dormitory room or a wisdom-related one on how one
might apply an interest one has to make the world a better place.
There is also a non-verbal creativity-based question for students
who prefer to show their skills nonverbally. An example would be
a creative advertisement for a new product. Applicants will have
the option of answering one question in order to show a particular
strength of theirs of which they wish the admissions committee to
be aware.
The questions are based on the research we did on the Rainbow Project.
We have also done similar research with other populations, for example,
a population in a business school.
In the Rainbow Project, we tested roughly 1,000 high school and
college students from across the country, situated in 15 different
schools. The colleges ranged from unselective to highly selective.
We found that by using Rainbow assessments of creative and practical
skills, we could substantially increase prediction of freshman grades
beyond SATs, and substantially decrease ethnic-group differences
relative to SATs.
Q: What results you are hoping to see?
A: We hope that, in the long run, our procedures will help us optimize
the selection of future leaders. We are also interested in increasing
both academic excellence and diversity and the Rainbow research
suggests that assessments such as the ones we are using will help
us accomplish all these goals. The SAT is a reasonable, but narrow
measure. It is sad that colleges limit their testing to tests that
are much like the tests of a century ago. The tests are good, but
they cover only a narrow range of abilities. Our goal is to expand
the range of abilities assessed and also to recognize that abilities
are modifiable.
Q: How will you know if you have succeeded and how long will
it take to know?
A: After the first experimental year, we will begin an assessment
of the efficacy of the new measures. In particular, we will compare
the success of students who were in a given admissions band (of
which there are 7, ranging from a high of "1" to a low of "7") who
excelled on our measures versus students in the same band who may
have excelled in other ways, but not on our new measures. By comparing
students in the same band, we roughly equate their overall strength
as applicants. We expect to have some data within two years.
The purpose of psychological research should be, in the long run,
to make a difference to the world, not merely to be published in
journals. I started at Tufts a year ago, and am hoping that I can
help make the university, and ultimately, the world, a better place
through the application of psychology. But all initiatives are a
team effort and the work will succeed only with the support of many
others!
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