Iowa Board of Regents to review admission gauge

The Board of Regents in the coming year will reassess a scoring system it enacted five years ago to gauge the potential for success of incoming students and qualify them for automatic admission to the state's three public universities. The decision came after recently realizing a growing number of applicants to the University of Iowa were not being scored.

The Regent Admissions Index (RAI), which went into effect in fall 2009, generates a score for each applicant to the UI, Iowa State University and the University of Northern Iowa using ACT or SAT test scores, cumulative grade-point average, the number of completed high school core courses and class rank.

Students from Iowa high schools who earn a score of at least 245 and take the minimum number of required courses qualify for automatic admission to the state's universities. Out-of-state students also receive scores, but universities don't have to automatically admit them if they score at least 245.

Universities are given discretion to admit individuals with lower scores on a case-by-case basis.

Board of Regents Executive Director Robert Donley told The Gazette the RAI is 'working well for us.” But, he said, it's not a perfect system - especially now that a growing number of high schools are choosing not to rank students.

While ISU and UNI have come up with an alternate way of calculating RAI scores for students without class rank that involves a 'sophisticated statistical methodology,” the UI simply excludes them from the RAI count and instead conducts 'individual student reviews to determine admissibility,” according to Donley.

Board officials realized this difference recently - and became concerned - after looking deeper into how many students with low RAI scores are admitted into each university and why, Donley said.

According to regent documents, the UI in 2013 admitted 20.8 percent of its applicants with scores below 245 - or 237 students - while ISU admitted 36.9 percent of its low scoring applicants - or 526 students - and UNI admitted 79.6 percent - or 367 students.

Although those numbers are small compared to the thousands of freshmen admitted to each university each year, and not all of those admitted students actually enroll, media reports and a guest opinion in The Gazette in June prompted Board of Regents staff to take a closer look into the discrepancies.

'When we started seeing some of the stories, and I got phone calls here from folks who were saying, ‘How can this be so different?' I asked questions,” Donley said.

Upon further inspection, Donley's office found that because a growing number of today's applicants come from high schools that no longer use class rank - 40 percent - the UI, presumably, was omitting many applicants from its RAI count, Donley said.

'You can't make the comparisons with the other two schools if you're not following the same formula,” Donley said. 'It's not their fault that those high schools are not ranking class members, but certainly there needs to be some part of the formula that accounts for that.”

Len Hadley, former Maytag chief executive officer, wrote a guest opinion for The Gazette in June that, among other things, critiqued ISU and UNI for admitting more students with low RAI scores and praised the UI for admitting fewer of those students and for increasing its four-year graduation rates.

Hadley made those comments after representing the UI on a task force that earlier this year recommended a new way of allocating state funds to the universities that could pull up to $47.8 million in UI allocations.

Hadley was the only member of the task force who did not support the new funding metrics, and he's since said the task force was flawed and it produced an imperfect result.

Donley has written a response to Hadley's opinion, outlining the discrepancies in how each university handles RAI for students without class rank. It appears in today's Insight section.

'While it may appear, as noted by Mr. Hadley, that Iowa State University admits more students with an RAI below 245 than does the University of Iowa, it is impossible for the University of Iowa to determine actual RAI admissions as it does not calculate an RAI formula for all of its students, as does ISU,” Donley wrote.

Hadley, when contacted about Donley's comments, agreed that the regents should insist on consistent practices from school to school.

'Mr. Donley suggests that does not now exist, so it is an opportunity for improvement,” he said.

Donley said it's 'obvious” an assessment of the sustainability of the current RAI process needs to occur. But he told The Gazette that he doesn't want to get ahead of the Board of Regents by discussing details of what might be involved in that evaluation. IS this in his opinion col.? Or he told you?

Diana Gonzalez, chief academic officer for the Board of Regents, said the review not only will look at how RAI scores are calculated - including for applicants without class rank - but it also will analyze how and why students with scores below 245 are admitted.

'This will be an evaluation of how the RAI is working, and that would certainly be one of the components,” she said.

Phil Caffrey, ISU director of admissions, operations and policy, said Iowa State officials decided when the admissions index first was enacted that they did not feel comfortable doing a 'holistic evaluation” for those students without class rank.

'We believe strongly in keeping our admissions process as transparent and objective as possible,” Caffrey said.

So ISU admissions officials came up with a 'calculator” to estimate class rank for students without one based on cumulative grade-point average, number of semesters of math and number of semesters of lab science, Caffrey said.

Officials then plug that estimated class rank into the admission index to come up with a score for those students. Caffrey said he's not found that the estimation system provides an advantage or disadvantage for students without class rank.

'We wanted to come up with a fair and objective process for admitting students who don't rank,” Caffrey said.

ISU does allow some subjectivity in its admission process when evaluating students with RAI scores below 245. Officials also look at course preparation and grade trends, Caffrey said.

'What we are trying to do it determine if they have a reasonable chance to be academically successful,” he noted.

Joseph Brennan, UI vice president for strategic communication, said that is what directs UI's admissions decisions, and the university is looking forward to having a conversation about the way RAI is calculated.

'We welcome the review,” he said. 'Anything that provides more clarity, consistency, and a transparent look at the admissions process is a good ting.”