SAT scores were found to be correlated with FYGPA (r = 0.54), with a magnitude similar to HSGPA (r = 0.56). The best set of predictors of FYGPA remains SAT scores and HSGPA (r = 0.63), as the addition of the SAT sections to the correlation of HSGPA alone with FYGPA leads to a substantial improvement in prediction (Δr = 0.07).
Okay, but
this study found that the SAT I is a poor predictor compared to grades. Also, that article you cited was written by the College Board. They don't seem to be in a position to be objective about the value of the SAT!
Lots of studies have found that high school grades and SAT scores together are predictive. A recent study found that previous studies may have underestimated their predictive power because they do not control for course selection effects where able students cluster in the same courses, which may be graded on a curve.
http://pss.sagepub.com/content/20/7/822.abstractIndividual Differences in Course Choice Result in Underestimation of the Validity of College Admissions Systems
Christopher M.
Christopher Berry, Wayne State University, Department of Psychology, 5057 Woodward Ave., 7th Floor, Detroit, MI 48202, e-mail: berry@wayne.edu.
Psychological Science July 2009 vol. 20 no. 7 822-830
Abstract
We demonstrate that the validity of SAT scores and high school grade point averages (GPAs) as predictors of academic performance has been underestimated because of previous studies' reliance on flawed performance indicators (i.e., college GPA) that are contaminated by the effects of individual differences in course choice. We controlled for this contamination by predicting individual course grades, instead of GPAs, in a data set containing more than 5 million college grades for 167,816 students. Percentage of variance accounted for by SAT scores and high school GPAs was 30 to 40% lower when the criteria were freshman and cumulative GPAs than when the criteria were individual course grades. SAT scores and high school GPAs together accounted for between 44 and 62% of the variance in college grades. This study provides new estimates of the criterion-related validity of SAT scores and high school GPAs, and highlights the care that must be taken in choosing appropriate criteria in validity studies.
