Is the SAT 'adversity score’ necessary?

The College Board, which runs the SAT, announced it will start giving a new metric to colleges so they can consider factors like the average income level, crime rate and education level of a student's neighborhood and school. The College Board said the number — which has been referred to as an “adversity score” — is designed to help colleges know what students have overcome in a way that a simple test score can't do. Whether it's affirmative action or the recent bribery scandal, how colleges decide who they admit is always a heated issue. This score could help address achievement gaps between rich and poor students without wading into fraught, and often legally precarious, waters of race in college admissions. But opponents of the idea say it's unfair to give one group a boost on a test that's designed to be an equal playing field for everyone.