The Failure of the SATs

This year over 1.4 million high school students will spend a grueling Saturday morning taking the infamous SAT I exam in an effort to gain admission to a post-secondary institution. One of the great trademarks of the college admissions process, the SAT I, is still required by over 80 percent of colleges throughout the nation. And Harvard is no exception; in fact, an extremely high SAT score is practically a necessity for admittance to Harvard—the average score of accepted students is around 1490, a score in the 99th percentile. But as the SAT I gets a facelift—the newest version will be released in 2005—it’s time that the college admissions world reevaluate its use of the test and scrap it altogether.

In the 1920s at the urging of then Harvard President James Bryant Conant, Harvard began using the test in order to identify America’s brightest students who did not necessarily have the benefit of being a legacy or attending a prep school. It was developed by Princeton psychologist Carl Brigham, who based many of the questions on an intelligence test had developed for the U.S. army. The test’s now infamous acronym stood for Student Aptitude Test, and was intended to measure exactly that. Since the SAT’s inception, however, the College Board has “tried to move away from the word aptitude,” according to Kristin Carnaham, associate director of Public Affairs for the College Board. The College Board website reflects this same message, stating instead that the test has attempted to focus on “student reasoning based on knowledge and skills developed by the student in school coursework.”

But in this current state, the SAT I is often criticized for rewarding students who have the time and money to extensively prepare while discriminating against those with fewer resources. When former President of the University of California (UC) system Richard C. Atkinson announced his recommendation that the SAT I be scrapped from the admissions process in California, he said that the turning point for him was a trip to an upscale private school, where he learned “that they spend hours each month—directly and indirectly—preparing for the SAT.” He said, “The time involved was not aimed at developing the students’ reading and writing abilities but rather their test-taking skills. I have concluded what many others have concluded—that America’s overemphasis on the SAT is compromising our educational system.”

Although the obsessive culture of test preparation persists, proponents of the SAT I maintain that the exam works as a helpful indicator of future academic success. Harvard’s Director of Undergraduate Admissions Marlyn McGrath Lewis maintains, “The SAT I has been a long time valuable tool for us;” similarly, Julie Peterson, a spokesperson for the University of Michigan, supports the SAT I for its “predictive value in how a student might succeed.”

Despite support for the SAT I from admissions officers at elite institutions, an investigation conducted by the UC schools system—the single largest institution to require both the SAT I and SAT II—revealed the SAT I was a worse indicator of future performance than the SAT II exam or high school GPA. The study also revealed that reliance on the SAT II reduced the effects of socio-economic differences among applicants, thus correcting the major complaint against the SAT I. Dean of Admissions and Financial Aid William R. Fitzsimmons ’67 recognizes those predictive shortcomings of the SAT I. He says, “If you want to predict grades at Harvard, the best thing is the AP or International Baccalaureate exam, followed by the SAT II, followed by the SAT I, followed by high school grades.” While thankfully Fitzsimmons recognizes the test’s many flaws, many schools do not. And more disturbing, these shortcomings will only be exacerbated by the newest version of the SAT I.

Four hours long, the newest version of the SAT I will do away with the once infamous analogies, and instead feature a number of shorter critical reading passages. The math section will now require knowledge of Algebra II, and the exam will include a new section called “writing,” which will focus on grammar and require an essay. The College Board took its own initiative to revamp the test, concerned that the UC system might no longer require the exam. According to the Board, “The new SAT will improve the alignment of the test with current curriculum and institutional practices in high school and college. By including a third measure of skills—writing, the new SAT will help colleges make better admissions and placement decisions.”

Despite its changed format, the new SAT seems likely only to reinforce the socio-economic bias of the exam. Consider the new writing section. According to Fitzsimmons, writing skills strongly correlate with personalized education more often received by students from affluent backgrounds. He said, “In the real world I would make one prediction, the writing, the third R, really does require small classes and lots of individual attention. You will see students from poorer backgrounds do quite badly on the writing portion of the new SAT.”

The changes to the quantitative reasoning and critical reading section of the exam will also do nothing to fix the problems associated with the socio-economic bias of the SAT. Incorporating Algebra II will unfairly benefit those students who have had the educational opportunity to study intermediate algebra and who have had access to preparatory resources and tutoring.

While admissions officers do require a way of measuring students’ abilities with a common yardstick, the SAT is not the answer. In lieu of the extensive reliance on the SAT I by admissions committees nationwide, the SAT II exams should be universalized and used instead. Until the SAT I can prove its usefulness as a unique source of information in assessing a student’s application, it should be shelved.

Harry I. Ritter is a first-year in Canaday Hall.