SAT Persuasive Essay
Should the SAT be used for college entry?
Thousands of high school students spend the spring semester of their junior year stressing and studying for one of the most important tests that will get them into college, the SAT. The Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT), created in 1920, is used to select each year's incoming freshman class.(source ) The “standardized test” is regarded as the test that will predict how students do in college. Therefore, colleges use students SAT score as the deciding factor on whether they are accepted into their dream school or denied due to not reaching the “benchmark.” Many strongly stand by the SAT as they believe it is the test that provides students “equal footing” ( Source) and allows them to demonstrate what they have learned from their high school experience. However, …show more content…
over the last couple decades, there have been significant trends of minority groups, lower-income families and women being greatly underrepresented in their scores on the SAT, which raises the question: does the SAT actually provide students with “equal footing?” The Scholastic Aptitude Test is strongly biased against racial minority groups, low-income students and women.
Therefore, the SAT should not be a deciding factor for college admissions as it is an unfair assessment of student potential.
Based on information released from college board from the 2009 average SAT scores, there is a significant gap between white test takers and racial minorities. Why would there be racial bias in a standardized test, a test where “many test experts and educators consider to be fair and an objective way of assessing academic achievement?” (https://www.edglossary.org/standardized-test/) According to Researcher Jay Rosner, the reason for the consistent gap between white and racial minorities, especially African Americans, is because of the elimination of “black questions.” (source) College board uses an experimental section on the SAT to test questions that could be implemented in future tests. If the questions don’t test well, they are removed. However, test administrators decide what question
does well based on the performance of white students. Rosner reviewed 276 math and english question from the 1980 to 2000 SATs. Through this, he uncovered ‘black questions’, questions from the experimental section that black students answer correctly, these questions never made it onto the test. Instead, ‘white questions,’ the questions that white students answered correctly, almost always made it onto future SAT exams. SAT questions are mainly aimed towards white test takers, which explains the reason for white students surpassing students of color. The redesigned SAT is described, in College Board’s description, as an “appropriate and fair assessment” that promotes “equity and opportunity.” However, based on the results that have been ongoing for many decades, it proves how the SAT should not be a factor for admissions due to the specific selection of test questions that mostly complement white students skill set. The fact that whites are 49 times more likely to score at or above a 750 level on math compared to blacks, and 11 times more likely to score 750 or above on the verbal section proves how the SAT does not provide a “fair assessment” for all students around the world.(Source )Furthermore, the vast differences between the scores of students can be explained by student’s family income. African Americans and other minority groups ( Hispanics, and American Indians) have high poverty rates, and ultimately score much worse in comparison, “sometimes by hundreds of points.” (source) The more money a student’s family has strongly correlates with their SAT score (Source ) . The SAT seems to favour families with higher incomes. Based on College Boards data’s, moving up an income category is associated with an average boost of over 12 points in every category. Families with higher incomes can afford to put their children into programs, which can cost up to thousands of dollars. These coaching programs can significantly raise students’ by 0.25 deviations( source). Although colleges state that the SAT is not a primary factor of whether a student is accepted or not, Cohen, from Forbes, points out that “today, colleges are relying on standardized test scores when making admissions decisions to a far larger degree than they have in years.” (source ) This means that thousands of intellectual, diverse students with low incomes are automatically put in the reject pile because they didn’t have the money and the resources to pay programs like wealthy, rich families.This leads back to the questions of does the SAT truly provide students with a fair opportunity to prove their learning from high school? Should the uncontrollable factor of money be a deciding factor of whether a student is accepted or not?
Over the last 50 years, men have consistently scored over 30 points higher than women on the math SAT. (source ) Does this mean females aren’t as proficient in math compared to males? Not at all. Females face biased questions that apply to the strengths of their male peers. For example, one math question asked the students to examine a chart that showed more boys in a math class compared to girls. In the verbal section, students had to analyze a 19th-century argument that a woman's place is in the home. (source) At the surface level, some might say these questions won’t affect female performance. However, these type of questions that illustrate females as unworthy or incapable can trigger stereotype threat - “the risk of confirming negative stereotypes about an individual’s social group, race, gender due to the income of negative viewpoints.” (source) This mindset can overpower a women’s mindset and hinder them from performing well. Researchers sampled high performing male and female students for an experiment to examine the effect of stereotype threat on testing. Half of the students were told that their were gender differences on the test and that men generally achieve better scores. When the other group was informed that there were no gender differences on the test, women achieved equal scores as men, however, when students were told that their were gender differences, on the exact same test, men outscored women. Stereotype threat accounts for a 15 point advantage on a 100 point test, meaning that women who are equally as competent and prepared score 15% lower than men when stereotypes are emphasized. Another reason for females unpredicted academic performance is due to gender biased questions. On March, 1987, 1,112 students from the Princeton review took one form of the June SAT. The results were that males outscored females by 35 points. Among the math questions, there were 10 differences greater than 10 percent, all favoring men. Three of these questions were specifically about male enterprises. The question with the largest gender difference, 27 percent, required a computation on a basketball team’s record. (source ) In fact, the researchers further pointed out when math questions are related to female experiences, then males do not outperform females. This clearly illustrates why the SAT should not be a factor for college admissions, especially since 52 percent of test takers are women, meaning that the test is underpredicting grades for approximately 780000 young women every year. (source) Thousands of young women are being rejected from universities due to being underrepresented as well as an increased in negative self-perception of their own math ability.
According to college board, a main reason for the Scholastic Aptitude Test is to predict students performance in college. However, one study for the University of California, Berkeley, found that standardized test results, high school grades, and other factors only predict about 25-30 percent of outcome measures like college grades. Another study from Princeton University found that colleges and students can expect class ranks to change as much as 30 percent based on success on the SAT. (source) So, if the SAT does not necessarily predict a students success in college, opress groups low-income, racial-minorities, and female groups, why should it be a factor for college admission? One 4 hour long test should not overpower 4 years of hard work and persistence. The SAT should not be considered for college entry as it does not provide students with equal opportunity to demonstrate the learning they have acquired over their years of highschool.
Thousands of high school students spend the spring semester of their junior year stressing and studying for one of the most important tests that will get them into college, the SAT. The Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT), created in 1920, is used to select each year's incoming freshman class.(source ) The “standardized test” is regarded as the test that will predict how students do in college. Therefore, colleges use students SAT score as the deciding factor on whether they are accepted into their dream school or denied due to not reaching the “benchmark.” Many strongly stand by the SAT as they believe it is the test that provides students “equal footing” ( Source) and allows them to demonstrate what they have learned from their high school experience. However, …show more content…
over the last couple decades, there have been significant trends of minority groups, lower-income families and women being greatly underrepresented in their scores on the SAT, which raises the question: does the SAT actually provide students with “equal footing?” The Scholastic Aptitude Test is strongly biased against racial minority groups, low-income students and women.
Therefore, the SAT should not be a deciding factor for college admissions as it is an unfair assessment of student potential.
Based on information released from college board from the 2009 average SAT scores, there is a significant gap between white test takers and racial minorities. Why would there be racial bias in a standardized test, a test where “many test experts and educators consider to be fair and an objective way of assessing academic achievement?” (https://www.edglossary.org/standardized-test/) According to Researcher Jay Rosner, the reason for the consistent gap between white and racial minorities, especially African Americans, is because of the elimination of “black questions.” (source) College board uses an experimental section on the SAT to test questions that could be implemented in future tests. If the questions don’t test well, they are removed. However, test administrators decide what question
does well based on the performance of white students. Rosner reviewed 276 math and english question from the 1980 to 2000 SATs. Through this, he uncovered ‘black questions’, questions from the experimental section that black students answer correctly, these questions never made it onto the test. Instead, ‘white questions,’ the questions that white students answered correctly, almost always made it onto future SAT exams. SAT questions are mainly aimed towards white test takers, which explains the reason for white students surpassing students of color. The redesigned SAT is described, in College Board’s description, as an “appropriate and fair assessment” that promotes “equity and opportunity.” However, based on the results that have been ongoing for many decades, it proves how the SAT should not be a factor for admissions due to the specific selection of test questions that mostly complement white students skill set. The fact that whites are 49 times more likely to score at or above a 750 level on math compared to blacks, and 11 times more likely to score 750 or above on the verbal section proves how the SAT does not provide a “fair assessment” for all students around the world.(Source )Furthermore, the vast differences between the scores of students can be explained by student’s family income. African Americans and other minority groups ( Hispanics, and American Indians) have high poverty rates, and ultimately score much worse in comparison, “sometimes by hundreds of points.” (source) The more money a student’s family has strongly correlates with their SAT score (Source ) . The SAT seems to favour families with higher incomes. Based on College Boards data’s, moving up an income category is associated with an average boost of over 12 points in every category. Families with higher incomes can afford to put their children into programs, which can cost up to thousands of dollars. These coaching programs can significantly raise students’ by 0.25 deviations( source). Although colleges state that the SAT is not a primary factor of whether a student is accepted or not, Cohen, from Forbes, points out that “today, colleges are relying on standardized test scores when making admissions decisions to a far larger degree than they have in years.” (source ) This means that thousands of intellectual, diverse students with low incomes are automatically put in the reject pile because they didn’t have the money and the resources to pay programs like wealthy, rich families.This leads back to the questions of does the SAT truly provide students with a fair opportunity to prove their learning from high school? Should the uncontrollable factor of money be a deciding factor of whether a student is accepted or not?
Over the last 50 years, men have consistently scored over 30 points higher than women on the math SAT. (source ) Does this mean females aren’t as proficient in math compared to males? Not at all. Females face biased questions that apply to the strengths of their male peers. For example, one math question asked the students to examine a chart that showed more boys in a math class compared to girls. In the verbal section, students had to analyze a 19th-century argument that a woman's place is in the home. (source) At the surface level, some might say these questions won’t affect female performance. However, these type of questions that illustrate females as unworthy or incapable can trigger stereotype threat - “the risk of confirming negative stereotypes about an individual’s social group, race, gender due to the income of negative viewpoints.” (source) This mindset can overpower a women’s mindset and hinder them from performing well. Researchers sampled high performing male and female students for an experiment to examine the effect of stereotype threat on testing. Half of the students were told that their were gender differences on the test and that men generally achieve better scores. When the other group was informed that there were no gender differences on the test, women achieved equal scores as men, however, when students were told that their were gender differences, on the exact same test, men outscored women. Stereotype threat accounts for a 15 point advantage on a 100 point test, meaning that women who are equally as competent and prepared score 15% lower than men when stereotypes are emphasized. Another reason for females unpredicted academic performance is due to gender biased questions. On March, 1987, 1,112 students from the Princeton review took one form of the June SAT. The results were that males outscored females by 35 points. Among the math questions, there were 10 differences greater than 10 percent, all favoring men. Three of these questions were specifically about male enterprises. The question with the largest gender difference, 27 percent, required a computation on a basketball team’s record. (source ) In fact, the researchers further pointed out when math questions are related to female experiences, then males do not outperform females. This clearly illustrates why the SAT should not be a factor for college admissions, especially since 52 percent of test takers are women, meaning that the test is underpredicting grades for approximately 780000 young women every year. (source) Thousands of young women are being rejected from universities due to being underrepresented as well as an increased in negative self-perception of their own math ability.
According to college board, a main reason for the Scholastic Aptitude Test is to predict students performance in college. However, one study for the University of California, Berkeley, found that standardized test results, high school grades, and other factors only predict about 25-30 percent of outcome measures like college grades. Another study from Princeton University found that colleges and students can expect class ranks to change as much as 30 percent based on success on the SAT. (source) So, if the SAT does not necessarily predict a students success in college, opress groups low-income, racial-minorities, and female groups, why should it be a factor for college admission? One 4 hour long test should not overpower 4 years of hard work and persistence. The SAT should not be considered for college entry as it does not provide students with equal opportunity to demonstrate the learning they have acquired over their years of highschool.