http://chicagoist.com/2015/12/21/_illinois_high_school_juniors.php That’s a big change and a bad deal for current juniors who have been on the ACT studying path and will now have to go SAT.
Is there anything that prevents “current juniors who have been on the ACT studying path” from taking the ACT?
The conventional “wisdom” here on CC is that the ACT is easier than the SAT. Note that the article refers to the “notorious ACT”!
So… have them take the ACT on their own? If they are low income and the fee is the problem, fee waivers may be available.
It does seem weird to switch in the middle of the year though.
Most test takers don’t actually study for standardized tests so I’m not sure that this is going to be any sort of big problem. Unless, of course, the teachers were “teaching to the test” for the ACT… in which case, there are a whole lot of other problems.
Students interested in National Merit have to take both the PSAT and SAT. This is a good move for top students, at least.
with a savings of $1.3M, this is a no-brainer to a cash-starved state.
What would be even cheaper is not to require students to take the exam at all. What is the purpose of dragging kids who aren’t going to apply to college through college entrance testing?
I don’t know how it works in IL, but in MI it’s our alternative to state testing. I’m not sure what the cost difference is but it’s their way of monitoring how “well” students are doing.
I thought I’d ask my son, who took both tests within the last 2 yrs, what he thought about the change
His initial reaction was he liked the ACT better, because it had science and slightly harder math. (He got a 36 and 800; and thought both should have been harder…I remember him coming home and saying the SAT math was a joke). He said the SAT felt a lot longer so if stamina is important, then it would be a good test. (2310 on one try with almost no prep; he only took it at the last minute when he found out he had to in order to be considered for NMF, fall of senior yr) He said in his opinion there was too much grammar/punctuation.
So my son’s impression is the ACT is better from a STEM standpoint. He also realizes he may be biased against the SAT because he “had” to take it on relatively short notice, during a personally busy time.
The same in IL. The ACT was incorporated into the Praire State Test program, which measures high school progress/achievement.
In contrast, in my state of California, the powers-that-be run their own state tests. Then students have to pay extra for SAT/ACT.
True, but since it is a college prep test, those students who are targeting college, don’t have to pay out of pocket.
This seems like a really odd decision to me, given that the SAT is completely new and “untested” this year. PSAT results based on the new test format have been delayed a month … presumably because of issues with the score distributions and them scratching their heads on how they’re going to do percentiles, etc… And, ironically, because the new SAT is much more like the ACT…
“What is the purpose of dragging kids who aren’t going to apply to college through college entrance testing?”
They are trying to encourage students to try. They sometimes discover they can do more than they realize.
This might be a big deal for kids who need a certain score to graduate from high school. I can’t see it being a big deal for college bound kids.
Where are you required to have a certain SAT score to graduate high school?
It’s possible if the test is being used in the Prairie State Test Program mentioned above (I didn’t google to see if they had min test scores for graduation). But not realistic until they stop moving the goal posts on the tests (heck, in this case they changed the entire field by moving from the ACT to the SAT).
I’m not sure about the rest of IL, but my D is a junior and her HS is scheduled to take the ACT in April 2016. So I think this will affect rising sophomores, not current juniors. It will give CB a year to get the kinks out a bit more with the redesigned test. I do think the timing of this is strange, with all the recent snafus by CB. But, as pointed out above, Illinios is in a world of hurt financially (with the savings from this change, only 126.999 billion to go)
You can certainly pay to take the ACT. SAT is not big in the Midwest. Many schools in the area don’t list the average SAT numbers because they receive so few of them.
Illinois has required the ACT since about 2001.
The state of Illinois is notorious for changing their minds about education issues and not giving any warning. It is perfectly normal to force Universities to refund money to the state.
That’s interesting. My daughters did well on both tests but always a bit better on the SAT than on the ACT, and they found the SAT an “easier” and less painful test to take. I think that’s mostly because the SAT Math didn’t require you to remember and apply much actual math; it was more focused on “mathematical reasoning” ability, i.e., can you figure out conceptually how to solve a problem, and can you spot and avoid the traps and tricks the authors of the SAT build into certain questions? The ACT required more actual, straightforward computation and (as they experienced it) placed a greater premium on computational speed and accuracy to finish on time, so in their view the ACT involved more drudgery and was less conceptual. Some people may find the straightforward computational drudgery of the ACT “easier”; for others the more conceptual SAT is easier sledding. My daughters also detested the ACT Science section which didn’t require any actual knowledge of science but instead was mostly about interpreting graphs, charts, and data sets, something neither of them had much patience for but did OK at when required. No such skill set or patience with working with data required for the SAT.
But who knows what the “new” SAT will look like, now that it’s been retooled to more closely resemble the ACT which had eclipsed the SAT in market share? Getting Illinois to flip on mandatory testing is a huge coup for the College Board, probably enough to recapture their #1 market position, at least in the short term. Hard to see that it benefits Illinois HS students, though, and the savings to taxpayers are trivial, roughly 10 cents per capita. Given the history and culture of Illinois politics, my question would be, who got paid how much to make this happen? Clearly the parties with the greatest interests at stake are the College Board (SAT) and the ACT. Next greatest self-interest lies with the politicians and bureaucrats in a position to make the switch . . . if they can do so in a way that redounds to their benefit. As the late, great Chicago newspaper columnist Mike Royko pointed out, Chicago’s unofficial motto was “Ubi est mea?” Latin for “Where’s mine?” Pure speculation on my part, of course, but this strikes me as a potential “Ubi est mea?” moment/