<p>The SAT/ACT/APs are a good measure of one’s knowledge.</p>
<p>Standardized testing is a necessary evil. We sort of need a method of standardization between schools, especially when the schools themselves do not rank.</p>
<p>I mean, comparing two different students from the same school would be easy when it comes to academics, but what would happen if these two students came from highly different schools? To put it in perspective, kids with weighted GPAs of 4.0+ tend to be dime a dozen at some schools (Such as mine, where a 4.0 won’t even put you in the top 10%), while at others typically only the valedictorian tends to have above a 4.0. Some schools even have several students with a weighted GPA of over 5.0.</p>
<p>My point here is, there needs to be a way to gauge rigor by school. By doing away with standardized testing, it may end up green-lighting grade inflation across the nation as there will be nothing to keep the kids with inflated grades in check.</p>
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<p>ha, lol, I vaguely remember that you had, um, something like a, err…2400.</p>
<p>Now, ahem, on with the bias. It seems you kiddies are in need of a definitive answer.</p>
<p>Naturally, how one feels about standardized testing is based on their own performance. High scorers will rush to the defense of the SAT in order to preserve their bastion of self-attained elitism and their own notion of selectivity. That is expected. Underperformers, meanwhile, will seek to discredit the SAT as an ill-conceived convention, and try to present high scores as random chance unrelated to intelligence.</p>
<p>Consequently, the argument descends into justifications of high scores and excuses for low scores. If only it was the essay prompt; we would fill those two pages like that.</p>
<p>However, there are a few points that should not be debatable.
[ul]
[<em>]They do matter.
[</em>]They won’t disappear.
[li]They are fair.[/li][/ul]</p>
<p>Many schools are indeed test-optional and others place minimal weight on scores, however, the vast majority of schools admit students within their own historical SAT range, be that 1500-1700 or 2100-2200. Also note that National Merit scholarships are contingent upon PSAT qualifying score and many schools award merit aid and honors membership based on M+CR index. They do matter.</p>
<p>As to the continuance of standardized testing, consider how difficult college admissions would be without them. It would be hard to argue that an adcom can compare a 4.0 from Exeter academy and a 4.0 from the worst school district in American and decide to flip a coin on who gets in.</p>
<p>Finally, most people refer to socioeconomic and racial disadvantages when claiming that the SAT/ACT are unfair. I can’t ignore that there is a disparity between the average scores of these stratified groups, but I will point out that they are taking the same test. The same cannot be said of high school academics.</p>
<p>Is it a necessary evil? Maybe to those who score in the zeroth percentile.</p>
<p>It’s not a big deal. Mention your high school and how poor it was. They take that into account. I had a 3.9 GPA and a 31 on the ACT but came from a tiny, deeply impoverished area. I got into Emory and got tons of full scholarships from schools all around the US. </p>
<p>One of my roommates from my sophomore year graduated with a 25 on the ACT, went to a local college, transferred twice, came to Emory and then graduated from Emory with nearly a 4.0. He’s now at Harvard Law School. </p>
<p>Point is, take it easy. </p>
<p>You have a whole lot of time left to worry about the small stuff. Don’t do it in high school.</p>
<p>@JuniorMint, Where would you say a person who has a belief against studying for the SAT but gets a 1940 (both times, superscored 2020) falls? Because I’m adamantly against standardized testing. I believe studying for the SAT to be dishonest. Don’t try to say that those who benefit love it because that’s not entirely true.</p>
<p>That is an excellent score, and most students would be proud. However, you appear to have a bite-the-hand-that-feeds-you complex.</p>
<p>Here is an anecdote of two students. They are both in Calculus and allowed to use an index card of notes on the tests. One feels that he doesn’t actually learn the material if he uses a notecard (which is likely true) and doesn’t use it. The other does. At the end of the semester, one student has a 4.0 and the other does not. Has one learned more than the other? Perhaps, but will the adcoms know that? Absolutely not. Do not mistake hubris for righteousness.</p>
<p>Essentially, what you feel is a benefit (your high score), is actually a disadvantage, because it could have been higher. I won’t argue that studying is honest, but it is an opportunity that you are denying yourself. It may be unfair to others, but how is that fair to yourself?</p>
<p>I am a little curious. If you are adamantly against standardized testing, why did you take the SAT twice? I suppose you are right in that I cannot say that everyone who is a tippy-top scorer (2200+, 34+) will love their score, but I can say that most won’t be complaining.</p>
<p>How could studying be dishonest? I don’t see how it’s any different from studying for any other test. If no one could study, the people who knew everything already would have an advantage, and those are likely the people with better genes or better socioeconomic backgrounds and thus better schools. So it’s still not really fair.</p>
<p>I can’t go against my beliefs to look better to a college. I refuse to. I would rather explain my beliefs to a school in a short additional information section than go against my beliefs. My beliefs are me; they make me who I am. If a college could not respect my beliefs, the school is worthless to me. </p>
<p>As for the notecard example, that doesn’t apply in actuality. Because, as my chem and math teachers say, you can always look up the formulas. Your attempt to draw a parallel falls short. A more accurate parallel would be a student who refuses to study for a state standardized test because they believe the test is supposed to show what they learned in the class rather than the initiative they took outside the classroom because these standardized tests are supposed to essentially be teacher evaluations.</p>
<p>I took the test twice because it wasn’t until my mom already paid for the second that I developed my belief on the test. I wasn’t wasting my parents’ money. The first time I took the SAT, I was a walk-in. I hadn’t studied at all and I didn’t know until the day before that my mom planned to have me take the test. I focused on the math section because I wanted a strong math score and let the other sections slide (though I still ended up with a good score on those). I don’t think taking the test multiple times is dishonest but studying is lying to yourself about how ready you would really be. How many people remember anything after the test? I’m never going to use those words. I can’t even spell them most of the time (thank you learning disabilities). Of course, I keep referring to the reading section but it’s the most ridiculous. And the math section of the SAT is not real math. It’s logic puzzles. I love logic puzzles but I prefer numbers and actual math.</p>
<p>Studying is dishonest because, as I already said, “Instead of actually getting yourself prepared for college, you’re studying for a test to make it seem like you’re prepared.” It’s lying about how prepared you were. Lying is dishonest.</p>
<p>Halcyon, you make a perfect point. In no way could the current tests ever be fair. Because to have any chance at being competitive, people are forced to do the things I can’t bring myself to do. That’s why the entire thing needs to be overhauled.</p>
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<p>Studying is how prepared you are. If you want a perfect parallel, think of it this way. One student preps for the SAT. Another (you) does not. Essentially, we are all studying for the SAT in addition to doing well in high school. You, then, are actually doing less preparation. Studying for the SAT is not lying about how prepared you are for college, it is doing addition learning for an, albeit, one-off test, and being more prepared.</p>
<p>You say that students will forget those SAT words and logic puzzles as soon as they leave the test, but you are trying to justify that you never learned them.</p>
<p>To put it logically, you are attempting to explain a syllogistic relationship between studying, lying, and therefore, dishonesty. Yet, that is aiming for the bulls-eye of the problems with standardized testing and hitting yourself. What about the real cheaters? What about the test-doubles that you can use to purchase a high score? Cheating, not studying, is truly unfair. You are ignoring the legitimate dishonesty by calling every smart kid who ever studied a liar.</p>
<p>Believe what you may, and I will respect your views and arguments, but trying to argue against studying is like the couch-potato yelling at people exercising because their fit bodies do not represent what they actually are suppose to look like.</p>
<p>I am curious about this too, how would you redesign the test to make it [more] fair?</p>
<p>P.S. This has been fun. Thanks for the topic, Serenity.</p>
<p>Paid test doubles, you say? I wish that weren’t unethical because it sounds like a better job than McDonald’s.</p>
<p>Why would I learn something I don’t care to learn? Why would I want to learn something that I will not use ever in my life that will just cloud my brain with nonsense? </p>
<p>To me, studying for the SAT (and ACT) is lying. It’s lying because they are tests to show college readiness. Studying for them is saying that you are not as ready as you want the test to indicate. You are not as ready as the test will “indicate” supposedly in its weirdo way. You just know how to take the test. </p>
<p>I am not alone in my belief. People who actually listen to me and aren’t obsessed with the test get what I say. The test is rigged. It’s unfair. It’s unjust. </p>
<p>I would love to go deeper but my hand is shaking making it extremely hard to type and I can’t seem to stop it. I’ll try later.</p>
<p>While I don’t condone the incessant standardized testing that seems to be going on throughout the nation, as I find it inconceivable that a Scantron can truly measure somebody’s intellectual capability, the SAT and ACT’s pros seem to outweigh the cons. Most high schools do not operate in a synchronic manner with one another, and the difficulty and thoroughness of the curriculum in one school will likely vary from a neighboring school. Also, there has not been an established standardized grade point average scale, so weighted GPAs (and possibly unweighted as well) will vary from school to school. College adcoms need some form of weighing two probable candidates against each other, and standardized tests such as the SAT and ACT are one of the most effective ways of doing so. After all, if I worked as an admission officer, I could reasonably assume that an applicant whom had a 2300 SAT score and a 3.8/ish UW GPA is better prepared for college than an applicant who had a 1900 SAT score and a 4.0 GPA. (Well, of course there are other variables included, such as ECs, essays, recommendations, etc. but this is just a simple example to explain how the competitiveness and difficulty of one school easily varies from another.)</p>
<p>“Why would I learn something I don’t care to learn? Why would I want to learn something that I will not use ever in my life that will just cloud my brain with nonsense?”</p>
<p>To get ahead. Same reason I take history even though I hate it and will never use it.
(Your brain isn’t some kind of Rubbermaid tub in which the good/useful/interesting stuff must be taken out to make room for the nonsense. A little nonsense keeps us sane.)
And education isn’t only valuable for its potential relevance to some job.</p>
<p>I think that the person who scored 2200 after studying a lot and the person who scored 2200 with little or no studying at all are both more college-ready that the person who scored 1600, with or without studying.</p>
<p>I disagree so many other factors determine college readiness. The Sat is just one test.</p>
<p>Sent from my LG-VM696 using CC</p>
<p>make the test more private. no practice tests and so on. that way it eliminates studying for the test with private tutors, classes, and what not.</p>
<p>The companies make their own prep materials, which is sort of weird/questionable. But I don’t think the studying itself is bad. If you don’t allow studying, you’re testing raw intelligence and/or ability to take a strange test without being nervous.
People act like studying is somehow giving kids an unfair advantage. You could say that for any sort of practice, if your goal is just to see the innate talent someone was born with. But it’s usually not, and I don’t see what’s wrong with doing better on something because you worked harder.
The ability to study indicates college readiness because you have to study in college for different types of questions asked by different professors. Good students, given practice, will be able to adapt to the format of the SAT and ACT. (I’m not sure how good the companies are at accommodating disabilities, though.)</p>
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<p>I am not the type of person to see life as a competition. I’m an educator. One who spreads knowledge. I have wanted to be a teacher since I was 5. I am choosing the college in my state with the largest most available teacher prep program despite where I am told I should go. Getting ahead is not part of who I am. Life is not a competition. Yes, I am competitive but I know better than to think of life as a competition. We need cooperation to have a functioning society. We don’t need a bunch of selfish/self-serving bigots who say they have to be “one of the best”. Those attitudes and greed are why we have such a messed up political situation.</p>
<p>^That is quite admirable mate. :)</p>
<p>I am only a Sperry-wearing, CC-coveting, tea-not-coffee-drinking, “oh-thank-God-she-voted-for-Obama” elitist when I am on the internet.</p>
<p>My finals are over, so I’m ready for a good discussion!</p>
<p>-The College Board/its CEO makes lots of money
This is irrelevant to whether the SAT is a good test or not.</p>
<p>-The tests can be studied for
So can every other test, including IQ tests (that’s why you’ll have a hard time trying to find real IQ tests online to study with). However, the College Board does not claim the SAT is an intelligence test (though SAT scores are correlated with IQ). I don’t see why anyone would want to measure innate ability by itself for college admissions, instead of innate ability + hard work (given two people of equal aptitude, wouldn’t favoring the one that works harder be fair? If the SAT solely measured some innate ability, then the two people would get the same score. However, if studying can change the score a bit, then the one who studies more will get a higher score despite the two having equal abilities). Also, college tests can be studied for.</p>
<p>-Minorities get lower scores
And? They get lower scores (except for Asian Americans) in all aspects that relate to the college admissions process, including [participation</a> in extracurricular activities](<a href=“http://uex.sagepub.com/content/37/1/41.abstract]participation”>http://uex.sagepub.com/content/37/1/41.abstract). Their college GPAs are lower as well. This demonstrates a problem, but not with the tests - that would be like blaming the thermometer for your fever.</p>
<p>-Schools don’t teach (fill in the blank)
This is not a problem with the test, but rather the school.</p>
<p>-Caltech has take-home tests
This is the exception, not the norm. You wouldn’t try to disprove the link between lung cancer and smoking by saying “my uncle smoked a pack a day and he never got cancer,” would you?</p>
<p>Are there any points I missed?</p>