Strong scores will always help an application, even if a school is test optional. Many states will have schools open for regular testing by the end of August.
ACT must be relying on individual schools to decide whether to hold the test. Our school sent out an email saying that they aren’t holding the June test but will be set up properly, with safety precautions, for the July test and will hold it.
I wonder why SAT can’t add summer test dates. With so many kids not having taken the test even once, and some kids wanting to take subject tests, it would seem very difficult to get all the kids tested, especially in time for those applying ED and EA.
Given the problems with the online AP tests, I’d be worried about a long online standardized test. What if your WiFi glitches? What if the submission won’t upload? We are just one family, and it happened on one of our kids’ tests. She has to retake it, but that’s only 45 min. I couldn’t even imagine the distress that would cause a kid if it were the full SAT or ACT.
And yes, lots of schools are TO, but for certain kids, that high score is part of their full picture.
Actually, I believe we’re both right and wrong.
The CB manual (link below) in the Appendix section has a couple pages (45-46) on “honorariam” and “honoraria” paid to non-school personnel.
But either way, who pays the bill is irrelevant to the discussion. More humans will need to be hired in order to spread students out into more classrooms.
https://collegereadiness.collegeboard.org/sat/k12-educators/coordinating/testing-manuals
@sushiritto Oh, I always heard my teachers who proctored the SAT talking about how they weren’t being paid for it. But yes, if College Board wants to administer the SAT, more people will need to be hired, and in a perfect world THEY would pay for it. Not the school.
Athletes working to be recruited would benefit from having an SAT score on the books in case a second wave scuttles things again.
As far as I understood, the UC Academic Senate were originally tasked with looking into whether to drop standardized testing and after studying the issue recommended to keep it. It is interesting that the UC President recommended otherwise. I have not followed too closely but I remember reading initially that the UC Senate felt the SAT/ACT were important.
https://senate.universityofcalifornia.edu/_files/underreview/sttf-report.pdf
Specifically,
"How well do UC’s current standardized testing practices assess entering high school students for UC readiness? How well do UC current standardized testing practices predict student success in the context of its comprehensive review process?
The STTF found that standardized test scores aid in predicting important aspects of student success, including undergraduate grade point average (UGPA), retention, and completion. At UC, test scores are currently better predictors of first-year GPA than high school grade point average (HSGPA), and about as good at predicting first-year retention, UGPA, and graduation.
For students within any given (HSGPA) band, higher standardized test scores correlate with a higher freshman UGPA, a higher graduation UGPA, and higher likelihood of graduating within either four years (for transfers) or seven years (for freshmen). Further, the amount of variance in student outcomes explained by test scores has increased since 2007, while variance explained by high school grades has decreased, although altogether does not exceed 26%.
Test scores are predictive for all demographic groups and disciplines, even after controlling for HSGPA. In fact, test scores are better predictors of success for students who are Underrepresented Minority students (URMs), who are first-generation, or whose families are low-income: that is, test scores explain more of the variance in UGPA and completion rates for students in these groups.
One consequence of dropping test scores would be increased reliance on HSGPA in admissions. The STTF found that California high schools vary greatly in grading standards, and that grade inflation is part of why the predictive power of HSGPA has decreased since the last UC study."
Anecdotally, we have a friend whose son took AP Chemistry at the same time as our son. The son goes to a smaller high school and for various reasons struggled with the class but ultimately received an A, as did DS. On the AP Chem exam, the friend’s son scored a 2 (and we understand most of the class did very poorly) and our son got a 5 (and most of the class scored 4’s and 5’s). I think HS GPA’s continue to get inflated and think that standardized test scores still have a role to play although it would be nice to see a better org than CB responsible for it.
“College Board might stick around as a company because it also offers CLEP and AP exams”
Agree, the C/B does a lot of things outside of the SAT, even the PSAT may stick around for the National Merit organization. Their bigfuture tool is popular and they’ve done a lot of work in increasing access for first gens, urms, low-SES etc… I recall reading a paper that basically said, (paraphrasing), once the college board got behind a certain proposal, people started taking it more seriously. Despite its reputation on c/c, it does have credibility.
CB also is the keeper/developer of the CSS Profile, which most private schools use for FA. Filing Profile and submitting to schools is pretty expensive, and likely brings in significant revenues for CB. I don’t see CSS Profile going away anytime soon either.
When ds registered last week (what a nightmare!) in the fine print CB stated that if August was canceled they were prepared to offer the test online.
Yesterday, College Board announced that there will not be an online at-home test this fall.
I wonder how national merit will handle things if psat is not available to everyone who wants to take it.? My D tested last year and did not make the nms cutoff…but it was nice to know that she at least had a chance.
Will they have test locations set up big tents outside so that test takers can take the test outside with sufficiently large social distancing?
I actually got through to the CB the other day by telephone for assistance in transferring a June registration to August. I got through in the morning; and the previous afternoon my calls kept getting disconnected while on hold. So it is possible, at least in the morning. They told me that the desks would be spread out more than usual and registrants limited. My kid got in for the August date only because he was a “priority” registrant from June.
Why/based on what? Why does cancelling August mean they can’t do September, October, November, etc.? Add another date to use the test prepared for August?
Yes, right now students are relatively close. But, at least at our school, that’s in one room. Our school has at least 100 rooms. When my D took the Subject Test, the SAT kids were all in one room and then two taking a Subject Test shared a single room.
Even with hundreds of kids taking the test, way more than expected, that’s 3-5 in an entire classroom. Sure, more proctors are needed. But it’s probably more like 10-15 to a classroom.
They won’t say it, but one reason for not having an at home SAT is it would be a nightmare as far as cheating is concerned. It would be hard to prevent someone from relaying answers despite the technological proctering.
These schools have lots of classrooms, so if they are still doing this distancing, they should be able to put students in a bunch of classrooms rather than just a big lunch room.
“I also wonder if colleges and universities might accept the PSAT as an alternative as it is widely administered in the fall of junior year. I haven’t heard anybody discuss that as an option yet.”
U. Mich has already said they will.