With graduate scheme applications season almost upon us, I thought it was a good time to share a few top tips for disabled students taking psychometric tests.
Here are my top 5 tips:
- Communicate with the employer. If you have an idea of what might be the right adjustment / adjustments for you, it is important for the employer to be guided by you. However if you are not sure what you need, employers might have supported other candidates requiring adjustments, so it might be they are able to make some suggestions.
- If the employer hasn’t specified what type of tests you will be taking, ask them for some more information. For example, you might find out you will be doing a numerical reasoning test and you have practiced those and know you don’t need any adjustments making.
- Lowering the pass mark is not a common adjustment.
- Situational judgement tests (SJTs) can be particularly tricky. Some employers even give the option to take a different test altogether. If you find SJTs hard, adjustments include having a reader present for the test. This person would read aloud the questions to you
- If you have 25% extra time at university to complete coursework or exams, this might not be enough extra time for psychometric tests (you may require 50% for example) or this might not be the right adjustment at all
You can find more tips for navigating psychometric tests here on our Disability Task Group psychometric tests resource: https://www.agcas.org.uk/Task-Groups/disability-task-group/137586
(Once you click on this link, under the first heading on the page DISABILITY TASK GROUP, click on the third green box called PSYCHOMETRIC TESTS: A GUIDE FOR DISABLED CANDIDATES. You will then be able to download a copy of the resource without the need for an AGCAS log-in. This’ll make it easier for you to share a copy with students / upload the resource onto your university careers website should you wish to).
Edmund Lewis, LSE Careers, AGCAS Disability Task Group
AGCAS Disability Task Group Blog 