"This was not a good day for my colleague, Forbes Executive Editor Luisa Kroll. She spent hours trying, and failing, to register her 17 year-old daughter for the $70 ACT college admissions test. ACT’s website crashed. She tried phoning and a recording said that call volume was too high to even put her on hold. At day’s end, a notice was finally posted online advising would-be test takers to try again tomorrow …
… The pandemic continues to wreak havoc on college admissions testing. Manhattan-based College Board, the nonprofit that administers ACT’s competitor, the SAT, had to cancel a series of test dates. It angered students and their families when it announced it would offer an online SAT and then abruptly canceled that plan in early June after its online Advanced Placement tests had technical problems. It’s facing a $500 million class action over the botched AP. (College Board calls the suit a “PR stunt” and says it is ‘baseless factually and legally.’)
There have also been problems reported with the International Baccalaureate, a rigorous curriculum offered internationally, including in some public schools in the U.S. It is administered by the nonprofit IB Organisation, based in Geneva, Switzerland. Instead of sitting for tests, students were given grades that reflected their performance for the semester, including their work in online classes. Many students believed they received marks that were lower than they would have earned had they been able to take the test." …