The E-Rater is computer software that scores the the analytical writing component of the GMAT. Of course, the software rates the text based on structure and grammar, not logic. According to the Washington Post, the E-Rater may soon be used to grade the GRE, the Test of English as a Foreign Language, and eventually college admission tests:
More than 2 million essays have been scored by e-rater since it was adopted for the GMAT in 1999, and the technology is being considered for use in the Graduate Record Examination, for graduate school admissions, and the Test of English as a Foreign Language, which assesses the English proficiency of immigrants entering U.S. schools.
Testing experts predict that machines eventually will help grade the SAT and the ACT, which will add writing sections in their 2005 college admissions tests, because computers cost less money and work faster than humans. Before technology entered the picture, teams of people graded each GMAT essay. Now one person's judgment is compared with the machine's conclusion.
"It is sort of inevitable," said Jeff Rubenstein, vice president for technology at the test-preparation company Princeton Review, "but it is also sort of regrettable." He said he knows test takers "who are brilliant writers, but they write very subtly," and when a machine is grading them, "they score terribly."
Link (via A Great Notion)
