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[quote]
In a recent article in the New York Times, an MIT professor Les Perelman was able to plot essay length versus essay score on the new SAT. The correlation found between them was strikingly high. He argued that he was able to hold up an essay just far enough away to be illegible, and guess what the score of the essay was from the length and shape of it. He was correct 90% of the time.
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I found this today and thought that those of you who have or will be taking the SAT might be interested in seeing it. I've not taken the SAT nor plan to, but I have taken the ACT and from what i've seen it's likely that the same holds true for it too. </p>
<p>Essentially, what this seems to suggest is that essay length is by far the predominant factor in SAT essay scores. Should this be taken to mean that the SAT essay graders care little about anything other than length of the essay? Or should this be construed as meaning that those who have the fastest hand writing also happen to be the best at composing excellent essays? </p>
<p>I'm thinking the former is more likely to be true. Opinions?</p>
<p>I think that an important quality of the essay is fleshed out examples, those with lots of detail and explanation. This kind of essay would obviously be longer, while one composed of general statements would be shorter. Obviously, some people write awful but long essays, but I'd say that better essays are usually longer, and poorly written essays where the points are not well supported are shorter.</p>
<p>While there may be a correlation between length and score, it is not necessarily one of cause and effect . The fact that an MIT professor conducted this "research" is what strikes me as most surprising, as this clearly undermines the mission of the institution itself- to trumpet to the world that cursory glances at things in life are never representative of what they really are</p>
<p>Correlation does not always (or usually for that matter) mean causation. I know plenty of kids who will be taking the SAT who, suprise, don't really care how well they do. Are these kids likely to plan, prepare, and right a long and detailed essay? No, they will probably just right a few simplistic paragraphs. On the other hand, the "long" essays on the SAT are, if I remember the study correctly, usually only 400 to 500 words long. For a good writer, a response for questions as broad as the ones asked on the SAT, 400 words would be very short. Basically, I think claims such as this one often ignore other possible factors.</p>
<p>I think I may be one of the weird ones then. I filled up every single line and only got a 9. The 9 really surprised me, on all my practice tests I was getting an 11 or 12.</p>
<p>Length isn't what gives you the score. You need a mature writing style and detailed paragraphs that support your thesis...whether or not the information in them is actually correct doesn't really matter, either.</p>
<p>The reason why length correlates with score is because give a really smart kid an open-ended SAT question, and he/she can go all over the place with it, expand on it, and just in general really knows what to write about. Give a dumb person that kind of question, and they aren't going to know where to go. It will take them longer to flesh out their examples. Etc. </p>
<p>What that article is really evidence of is that once again America's "prestigious" universities fail us...hahaha.</p>
<p>English grades all through school: A/A+'s
Essay grades all through school: A's
ACT English score: 35, then a perfect 36.</p>
<p>April ACT essay: pre-planned, very well designed and structured. Was confident in it. Barely over 1 page written, though, due to pre-planning and slow handwriting. Score: 5/12 (4% percentile)</p>
<p>June ACT essay: No essay studying done. Same essay form used, but did no pre-planning and simply wrote my head off on a hunch that length matters the most. Essay was sloppy, very disorganized, and very disappointing in my eyes, but managed to double the original essay length and churn out 2 solid pages. Score: 8/12 (70% percentile)</p>
<p>Make of it what you will. I'm told that both ACT and SAT essays are graded by the same company.</p>
<p>uhh i have a question, How could u get a perfect score on the ACT with only an 8 On the essay ..is that even possible??...and a 5 on the essay could be a possible 35? is THAT possible?..that would be so cool if it is...</p>
<p>On the ACT, the English test is scored separately from the Writing test. There is a base writing score and also a combined English/writing score, but neither of those are factored into the composite score - only the English score is.</p>