@amsunshine At least in Illinois, if you are absent on the day of the test, they have other test option days and everyone finds a day.
I got the impression that it’s a logistical reason as to why the school can’t take a student’s SAT score from another sitting. The state is using these scores for data and having them all (or almost all) of them on the same test day allows them to grab the information easily for analysis. If they had kids somehow entering other SAT scores from other dates, that would be a mess. Plus, GC’s would have to run down every junior and get them to enter score. Just not realistic.
I think every state has some sort of state testing, no? It just happens that Illinois uses the SAT for that purpose. Illinois signed a contract with College Board and paid them a lot of money. One can try to look at it as the “state testing”. it just happens to be an SAT. I think that’s what’s confusing to parents sometimes. The only catch is that, if you apply to a school that wants all sittings, I believe you would have to report it.