National SAT average drops, but should the SAT count so much?

Within the protected shell of Saratoga High, the average SAT score has risen 31 points in five years—from 1,909 points in 2007 to 1,940 in 2011. While this gradual improvement benefits Saratoga students and their chances of gaining college acceptance, the U.S. as a country experienced a 9-point decline to 1,500 in the nationwide mean from 2010 to 2011.

According to the College Board, which created and administers the SAT and the AP tests, the SAT is “a globally recognized test that lets you show colleges what you know and how well you can apply that knowledge.” The test consists of three 800-point portions: critical reading, mathematics and writing.

The 2011 critical reading and writing national averages—497 and 489, respectively—are all-time low scores since 1972. Educators and College Board employees worry that the modern education system stresses math and science over the core English skills of reading and writing. This may be true, but colleges should not use the SAT to completely predict an individual’s intelligence in the first place.

The College Board created the SAT in the hopes that it would be “fair to all test takers.” The test aims to evaluate a student’s past schooling and potential success at college. Test scores naturally correlate with one’s ability to apply his or her learned skills in test-form. Some students, however, attempt to gain the upper hand by memorizing standardized math, vocabulary, grammar and writing techniques with the sole purpose of excelling on the SAT. This purposeless studying ruins the notion of an impartial test.

“Standardized-test results are positively correlated with [this] shallow approach to learning,” author and lecturer Alfie Kohn wrote in his book “What Does It Mean to Be Well Educated?”

Saratoga is a predominantly wealthy community in which more people can afford SAT prep courses and tutoring. Many places, however, are not as fortunate. Education expert Glenn Elert explains how test scores closely correlate with a student’s wealth and the education levels of his or her parents.

“The SAT is not a measure of how successful one will be in college, but how well one conforms to the demographics of the group that did well on the first exam,” Elert wrote in an essay entitled “The SAT: Aptitude or Demographics?”

Evidently, the SAT is not the impartial measure of education that the College Board claims it is. The decline in SAT scores therefore does not necessarily signify a degradation of America’s educational standards. According to the College Board, more students received at least three out of five points—a score accepted by some colleges for class credit—on AP exams in 2010 than took exams in 2001.

Growing numbers of students challenge themselves with (and succeed in) AP and honors courses.
Additionally, national participation in the SAT increased by more than 3 percent in the last year, the College Board said in its 2011 score report. Increases in the number of students aiming for colleges—particularly those who have little to no experience with the test—tend to draw down average scores. Thus, the drop in the national average merely marks the growing interest in college education among America’s student population, not a decline in national intelligence or education.

Some suggest different tests; others support eliminating the SAT altogether. Certain colleges have boycotted the SAT and other standardized tests in their admissions processes. While the SAT’s removal would weight extracurricular activities and grades higher in admissions, it would remove the demographic bias of standardized tests.

In any case, something as significant as college acceptance should not rely so heavily on a test that determines not knowledge nor aptitude, but one’s ability to fill in bubbles based on superficially acquired information.