U.S. Marine Corps Switches to Criteria's CCAT to Guide Officer Assignments

LOS ANGELES, CA - The U.S. Marine Corps announced that it will be using the Criteria Cognitive Aptitude Test (CCAT) to improve its process for assigning Marines to military occupational specialties. This marks a transition away from the General Classification Test, a World War II-era test that the Marine Corps had used for decades.

Criteria Corp is a leading provider of pre-employment assessments, and the CCAT is one of its most popular tests. The CCAT measures cognitive aptitude or the ability to think critically, solve problems, and digest and apply new information. These general cognitive skills are widely applicable to roles across all industries and job types. Having been administered over five million times, the CCAT has been rigorously validated to predict job performance.

For the Marine Corps, one of the main benefits of using the CCAT is that, compared to the General Classification Test, it takes a fraction of the time to complete. The CCAT takes just fifteen minutes to provide a scientifically valid measure of cognitive aptitude, while the General Classification Test takes over two hours to complete. In addition, the CCAT is a web-based assessment that can be taken on a computer or other internet-connected device, enhancing the efficiency of the assessment stage.

As part of the validation process, Criteria regularly reviews the CCAT for cultural sensitivity and for differential item functioning to ensure that the test is free of bias across cultural and gender groups. This ensures that no group has an unfair advantage, or disadvantage, when taking the assessment, making it possible to get an unbiased view of an individual's capabilities.

"We are thrilled to be working with the Marines and to be helping them streamline their talent identification process," said Josh Millet, CEO of Criteria Corp. "We look forward to a long and productive relationship."

The Marine Corps will test out the new assessment over the next five years, with plans to review the data on about 10,000 officers' scores. These data can then be used to find connections between the scores and officers' ultimate performance in their assigned specialties. The vision is for the CCAT to help the Marine Corps make more informed decisions and to find optimal matches for its officers so that they are set up for long-term success.

About Criteria Corp

Criteria is an assessment company dedicated to helping organizations make better talent decisions using objective, multidimensional data. By combining leading-edge data science with rigorous validation backed by I/O psychologists, we provide the most precise assessments available. Our suite of assessments is the most comprehensive on the market, covering aptitude, personality, emotional intelligence, and more to provide the most robust picture of talent. Since launching in 2006, our assessments have been administered more than 25 million times through our user-friendly platform.