ENTRANCE BY CERTIFICATE

In recent years the attempts of the College Entrance Examination Board to devise more accurate tests of ability for college candidates have met with considerable success, as the popularity of the New Entrance Plan and the Scholastic Aptitude Test indicate. The tendency has been away from the pedantic checking-up of mere factual knowledge, in favor of emphasis on the fundamental qualities which it is the function of colleges to develop.

At the same time the Board has been conscious of one of the chief difficulties which colleges encounter in admitting students. This is the inability to judge the value of certificates which admit students to college without examination, when those certificates are issued by small and remote schools whose marking systems and standards are unknown. For this reason colleges frequently admit men in no way qualified for advanced work, with the natural result of retarding the whole educational process.

To avoid this difficulty in future, the Board proposes to establish "validating examinations," to test the worth of such certificates. These examinations would be similar in purpose to those given to candidates for West Point and Annapolis. They would cover the main subjects without conflicting with regular examinations. To be successful, however, the examinations should be genuine indications of the student's quality and not perfunctory tests to be overcome by intensive cramming. If properly given they ought to hasten the day when colleges will no longer be burdened with misplaced individuals.