<p>The test or its grading is obviously defective if someone has figured out a way to “game” it (without technically cheating*) to produce a much higher score than the test taker’s ability in the subject is supposed to produce. It may have been an effective test before the vulnerability was discovered, but it is less trustworthy now.</p>
<p>*In terms of stealing unreleased tests, having someone else take the test for you, copying someone else’s answers, etc…</p>
<p>Do American colleges and universities even look at the verbal reasoning and writing SAT scores for applicants from Asia? Those tests were designed to be taken by native English speakers and the results are probably meaningless for Korean and other Asian applicants. I have lived in both Korea and Japan and can attest that hardly anyone in either of those two countries have any facility in the English language. Even the math section has word problems that could trip up excellent mathematicians who are not somewhat skilled in English. Most colleges probably just look at the SAT math scores of Korean, Chinese and Japanese applicants. If there is cheating, I doubt it is on the math section because Asians, with minimal effort and no outside help, can easily score much higher than most American students in math.</p>
<p>Lemaitre1:</p>
<p>Thousands and thousands of kids in Korea speak fluent English, and thousands have lived in Anglophone countries at some point in their lives. There are [elite</a> foreign language high schools](<a href=“Elite Korean Schools, Forging Ivy League Skills - The New York Times”>Elite Korean Schools, Forging Ivy League Skills - The New York Times) here (highest average SAT scores in the world) as well as international schools, all of which produce many Ivy-and-similar admits. Last year one high school had 12 one-sitting 2400s and over 20 superscore 2400s–out of around 100 graduates. There are tons of remarkable kids; it’s just too bad there are cheaters out there making them all look bad. I know from a decade of personal experience that there are many, many legit top students here with outrageous skills and knowledge, not to mention drive, ambition, self-discipline, and integrity.</p>
<p>This is why I’m so bent out of shape about the cheating.</p>
<p>Marvin 100 - I hate to break it to you but 32/100 - 2400 supescores or better? -Let’s just say it’s a statistical anomaly that defies honesty.</p>
<p>Or perhaps the superscored 2400s included the non-superscored ones, so you have 12 single-sitting 2400s and 8+ superscored ones…</p>
<p>Yeah, Catria has it–sorry, I was typing hastily and didn’t phrase it well. FWIW, the entire school is anomalous, as it draws from the very, very best of the students in a country profoundly obsessed with education.</p>
<p>Korea finished first last year in the International Math Olympiad for the first time. Were people celebrating over that?</p>
<p>[International</a> Mathematical Olympiad](<a href=“http://www.imo-official.org/results.aspx]International”>International Mathematical Olympiad)</p>
<p>I would like to see a similar chart correlating Math Olympiad scores vs country GDP per capita and we can elaborate further on whether all this intellectual prowess pays off at the end. A lot of countries have done really well but a lot of good that did to them…</p>
<p>As an Asian American myself who is partially Korean, this truly disappoints me and my partisanship towards fellow international Koreans.</p>
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<p>You are thinking along the line of Lynn and Vanhanen:</p>
<p>[IQ</a> and the Wealth of Nations - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia](<a href=“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IQ_and_the_Wealth_of_Nations]IQ”>IQ and the Wealth of Nations - Wikipedia)</p>
<p>I think the test scores are not so much a measure of a nations GDP per capita per se, but a good co-incidental indicator of a nations economic rise and decline.</p>