Organization: University of Illinois at Chicago
Date: Tuesday, 7 Apr 1992 13:07:52 CDT
From: <U49146@uicvm.uic.edu>
Newsgroups: soc.culture.african.american,soc.culture.asian.american
Subject: Re: Asian Immigrants on SAT English

=========================================================================
Organization: University of Illinois at Chicago
Date: Tuesday, 7 Apr 1992 08:58:00 CDT
From: <U49146@uicvm.uic.edu>
Newsgroups: soc.culture.asian.american
Subject: Re: Asian Immigrants on SAT English

In article <121835@lll-winken.LLNL.GOV>, tcheung@ramius.ocf.llnl.gov says:
>
>In article <92095.184430U49146@uicvm.uic.edu> U49146@uicvm.uic.edu writes:
>->In article <56838@cup.portal.com>, Arthur_T_Hu@cup.portal.com says:
>->>
>->>So ... Asian immigrants suffer even though they're smart because they
>->>don't have english skills.
>->>
>->This is not true.  There is a test called TOEFL (test of English as a
>foreign
>->language) administered by ETS that can be used as a substitute for the SAT
>(the
>->English part that is) for people whose native language is not English.
>While
>s
>->ome colleges might still require the SAT, TOEFL takes precedence in the     s
>Engli
>->h section (unless these people have been living here for ages), so you can
>hard
>->ly claim that Asians (or any immigrants for that matter) suffer because of
>thei
>->r English skills.
>
>No, what you said is not true.  TOEFL is used for foreign students only.
>SAT is still required for immigrants.  When I took SAT I was only in US
>for less than four years, and I know many other people who took SAT when
>they had been in US for even shorter amount of time.  Are you considering
>living here for 4 years as being here for ages?
>
>->
>->Sofia
>

>
>--
>Terry Cheung
>tcheung@ramius.ocf.llnl.gov

No.  The college applications I have seen up to date say that if your native la
nguage is not English, you have (or have the choice to) take TOEFL.  So this in
cludes also immigrants (unless you're native lge is English also).  And I did
say that the SAT is required by some colleges (actually not only for immigrants
but also for foreign students).  Now some college/universities say that you can
sub the TOEFL, others say that you don't have to take TOEFL if you graduated fr
om a high school where the principal language of instruction was English.  Othe
rs require both regardless, etc.  How they decide whether or not given the oppo
rtunities you had, you learned what they consider adequate is up to the individ
ual colleges.  And yeah I know of people who took the SAT in less than 7 months
since they were in this country and others who took it before even setting a fo
ot here.  Now how long you stayed here before you took the SAT, and whether or
not it was fair is a relative question.  Since English is an international lang
uage, I assume you had some kind of exposure to it in your school in Asia.  It
might have been lousy or good.  And when you came, it depends in what kind of E
nglish class you enrolled and the intensity etc.  When I said ages I meant some
thing like 10 years, but from my perspective 4 yrs is ages.  Anyway my whole po
int is that compared to native speakers, I don't see how these smart kids lose
ut because of English skills.  If theyare applying to prestigious schools, they
certainly have a lot of essays etc where they can make their situations perfect
ly clear.  As for other schools, I don't think they are very selective.If you l
ose out to a person with a relatively similar background, that's a different st
ory.

Whoa, that was long.  I have certainly not served on admissions committee (:) b
ut it would make sense to me that they have different standards.  Anyway my und
erstanding is that Asians (as some people like to hammer it) usually enroll in
technical fields, so I don't see why it really matters unless of course the co
lleges want to use it as a criterion b/n otherwise equally qualified candidates

Sofia