<p>In your opinion, do you think that the SAT is easier or harder than it was when you were in high school?</p>
<p>It’s easier. You can see that in the recentered scores. [SAT</a> I Individual Score Equivalents | Research and Development](<a href=“http://research.collegeboard.org/programs/sat/data/equivalence/sat-individual]SAT”>http://research.collegeboard.org/programs/sat/data/equivalence/sat-individual)</p>
<p>I can’t really remember the difficulty of the problems when I took it. I’ve tutored it a bit and it seems easier than I remember but that could be because I’ve earned a couple degrees in the interim.</p>
<p>What I do know is that we couldn’t use a calculator, or at least I didn’t, so for me that likely meant more stupid mistakes. We also used to have antonyms or analogies or something like that, which I always find tricky. They don’t have those now. </p>
<p>So I suppose it depends on what you find difficult. </p>
<p>Plus, like all parents, I had to take the test while walking uphill in the snow. :)</p>
<p>We didn’t study, so it must have been easier back then. We only took it once, so that was easier too. It didn’t determine the rest of our life - at least we didn’t realize it - so it wasn’t nearly as stressful.</p>
<p>The recentering in the 1990s means that the same performance results in a higher score now than it did before.</p>
<p>What was then called the Verbal (now Critical Reading) section was mostly a vocabulary test, with a few “read the passage” questions.</p>
<p>There was no Writing section, so that total scores were given out of 1600. There was a Test of Standard Written English attached to the SAT. It was a short multiple choice test on English grammar. It was similar to the Achievement Test (what SAT Subject Tests were called then) in English language (this test no longer exists, having been replaced by what is now the SAT Reasoning Writing test).</p>
<p>Then, as now, the Math section covered just algebra and geometry.</p>
<p>@ucbalumnus: A believe the updated SAT post-2005 includes trig and higher-level algebra? Someone correct me if I’m wrong here…</p>
<p>There are no analogy sections on SAT exams any more, and those were some of the most difficult for students without strong verbal skills, or who didn’t have practice or experience on tests. Removing analogies was one way of making the tests easier. It’s curious that they still appear on SSATs. </p>
<p>I think the test must be longer, with the addition of the writing section, but am not sure that wasn’t adjusted.</p>
<p>Some parts are easier; some parts are harder. For some students, the analogies were very easy. For others, they were mightmares. The same for QC in the math section. It is very hard to judge how easier or more difficult the critical reading has become. It all goes to the balance of the scores and the “curves” used.</p>
<p>The test is still designed to yield an average of 500.</p>
<p>Re: #6</p>
<p>More advanced high school math is (and was) covered by the SAT Subject (formerly Achievement) Math Level 2 test.</p>
<p>I loved the analogies!</p>
<p>Because the old SAT Verbal was mainly a vocabulary test*, there were prep books that consisted exclusively of lists of words found on the SAT. High school English teachers also had weekly vocabulary words for students to learn and be tested on.</p>
<p>*All of the analogies and the like were pretty easy if you knew what enough of the words meant, but hard if you did not.</p>
<p>@ucbalumnus: No, I’m aware of that, but I’m wondering if there was an increase in content area coverage in the math section of the regular SATs at some point in the past few years. I’m not talking about the SATIIs.</p>
<p>^^</p>
<p>In 2005, changes to the SAT included adding a few Algebra II questions. There is no trig on the SAT, although students who have mastered it could solve a few questions with trig shortcuts.</p>
<p>The current CR is also a. Vocabulary test with reading comprehension. Mabe differs in the number of each or difficulty but I’d need to see an old test to know if it was easier or more difficult… IMO fill in the blanks is the easiest vocabulary testing method. Most of the kids I tutored found it.easier than analogies. YMMV of course</p>
<p>I find it interesting that the top math scores would have actually been higher before recentering. D scored a 1480 with a 790 V/R and a 690 Math before recentering it would have been a 1420, 720V/700M. Interesting.</p>
<p>I think it’s much harder because it’s so much longer than the version we took. It’s a challenge to the kids’ mental stamina.</p>
<p>Those analogies make me misty-eyed with nostalgia. 
It was the thing everyone made fun of after the test.</p>
<p>I do not know how test designed to check middle school knowledge at the end of HS could be called hard. Anybody here actually look at it / did it?<br>
It explains why kids (especially advanced kids) absolutely have to study for it. They have to re-fresh middle school material.
Try to take the test and see for yourself.</p>
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<p>You can’t really compare old test scores to new test scores merely using re-centering. Re-centering is almost twenty years old and was a rough cut valid at that time, today not so much. There are many other factors that come into play today, including more kids taking the test and scoring very highly for various reasons. A 700 (or a 690) was more elusive pre-recentering than it is now.</p>
<p>If you look at the statistics comparing 1973 and 2012 (I happen to have both Total Group reports), in 1973 around 35,000 students scored 700 or over in Math. In 2012 it was around 118,000 students. In 1973 a score of 700 put you around the 97th percentile, today it’s around the 93rd percentile. A 690 is the 92nd percentile today. Impressive still, but not really the same.</p>
<p>MiamiDAP, when I took it in the 80s my school district didn’t have classes above pre-calculus Even the ids that went on to become engineers at Purdue and Rose Hulman went to college without calculus. So the SAT math had just been learned my sophomore year. That is a major difference with so many CC kids today. </p>
<p>Now the analogies were great for me, an avid reader, but a terror to many in our class. I also seem to recall questions about yachts and sailing, one test. Not something a kids from a farm town of 800 people would recognize. </p>
<p>I would have loved the writing test.</p>