Testing: Truth or Consequences?

It all started innocuously enough. The New York Public Interest Group (NYPIRG) included in its 1978 legislative agenda--right beside its diatribes on funeral costs and sugar content--the promise to work for a "truth in testing" bill, because "students and others whose careers are depending on the results of machine-correctable examinations have a right to know the significance of these tests."

Eighteen months later, the bill, signed by New York Governor Hugh Carey and due to go into effect January 1, has forced Educational Testing Services (ETS), the nation's largest testing firm, to devote 50 full-time workers "just trying to cope," Mary Churchill, associate director of information for the firm, says that "coping" will probably mean a cutback in the number of tests given in New York, and an increase in the cost of the tests, perhaps for all test-takers, not just New Yorkers.

Why are ETS officials so harried, and ETS critics so jubilant? Because, in the words of Steve Solomon, who drafted the bill for NYPIRG, "this bill could totally change the way tests are used." By forcing the test companies to release each corrected test to the student who took it, test opponents say the bill will expose the bases and inadequacies of the standardized exam. It applies to all mass tests except the specialized achievement and AP exams, and also forces ETS to release the results of all their studies on the accuracy of the tests.

No one is predicting exactly what will happen to the testing industry once the exams are disclosed. "Our basic thesis is that since the tests play such an important role in determining what colleges, professional schools, and professions people end up in, we all have a right to know what the exams mean," Ed Hanley, a Nader employee who lobbied for the truth-in-testing bill in Albany last year, says. Obviously, though, the right-to-know issue wouldn't be vital unless there was some hint the tests weren't worthwhile. "This will enable us to resolve once and for all the debate over what the tests are good for," Hanley says.

ETS is very quick to predict, however, what will happen to them. "We believe in this concept," says Churchill, a major admission from an officer of a corporation that last year mailed every state legislator more than 100 pages of anti-disclosure arguments. "We think this bill is much too sweeping, though," she says, quickly, and then grumbles through a list of the bill's weaknesses. "Who is covered? We may have to disclose this for everyone applying to a New York state school, and that would make our problems huge. What do we have to send? A xeroxed copy of every test means millions of pieces of paper. How much is it going to cost--these are the things that concern us."

The company's problems may be multiplied soon. Several states--Pennsylvania, Hawaii, Maryland, California and even Massachusetts are considering truth-in-testing bills of their own, Mary Ann McLean says. McLean is legislative assistant to Kenneth LaValle, the New York state senator who sponsored the bill. Congressional hearings were held this week, and will continue on September 24, on a national version of the same legislation.

In some ways, all that is overkill. "Exposing the test in one place is as good as doing it everywhere, in terms of allowing people to examine them," McLean says. "But we want to keep this momentum going and have it passed elsewhere, mainly so ETS can't isolate New York," she adds.

Originally, some had feared ETS would stop giving tests all together in New York. Now, though reductions in the number of tests given annually is likely, Churchill says, "I have heard no talk of a boycott." The only holdouts are the boards that administer the Medical College Admission Tests (MCATs) and Dental Aptitude Tests (DATs), both of which announced the day after the bill was passed that they were out of business in New York.

"We've heard nothing since from them," McLean says, adding that a court challenge to any boycott of New York might be instituted. "They haven't announced any change in their position, but they have stopped boasting about their move too. From what a lot of people have told me, it would be impossible for them to go through with it," she says, adding her suspicion that the boycott announcements were made in hopes of getting an exemption for the two tests. Cuts in service are likely. "I have heard a lot of talk about it from many of the boards, College Entrance Examination Board employee Sybil Stokes says.

"Reaction from admissions officials to the law and subsequent scraps have been muted. Medical School admissions director Dr. Ogles by Paul was unavailable for comment. His secretary said Paul "has refused to talk to the press about this." At the Law School, where there is no danger of a test boycott, admission director Molly Geraghty says, "people are paying attention to it. But, what we are mainly doing is sitting and waiting, and I think you will find much the same thing is true at other schools and universities." In any event, the LSAT will still be required, at least for another year, Geraghty says.

Beyond threatening to limit the tests, the other ETS response was to warn that test prices might increase. The reason, besides having to mail out the corrected tests, is that once the exams were avaialble for all to see, the College Board would have to think up new questions for every exam. "Questions are expensive to come up with," John Smith, media relations director for ETS, said last summer when the bill first passed.

Sponsors of the legislation, though, are convinced large price increases are unnecessary. "Poppycock," snorts McLean, adding that a report due to be released soon by Alan Nairn, a Ralph Nader employee, will show ETS is able to absorb the cost increases and a lot more. "We just don't believe they have any justification," Arty Malkin, a NYPIRG lobbyist, says. The Nairn report, five years in the writing, may also shed light on some other areas of the ETS operation, including some of the more basic questions about the adequacy of the exams.

Meanwhile, everyone is watching with interest. "We're waiting to see how the law turns out," truth-in-testing advocate McLean says. "We won't know anything definite until the law goes into effect January 1," admissions official Geraghty declares, "We need to see how this works out before we go ahead and do it on a larger scale," pleads ETS's Churchill. Only Malkin is making concrete predictions: "It should be interesting," he says.