They have the technology to use a computerized version of the test for everyone. The computerized version could be shorter in duration, because the computer can adjust the questions to the pattern of responses - in other words, if a student answers a difficult math question correctly, the computer moves to a higher level of difficulty, dispensing with the easier questions. </p>
<p>If they did this, many students could go in, and perhaps finish the entire test in 2 hours. Students with LD’s might take longer, but they still would not face some terrible 7 hour ordeal – because their time isn’t being wasted with easy questions they have already demonstrated an ability to answer, and they never reach questions that are beyond their capacity. </p>
<p>With computerized testing, actually, the SAT could be converted to a potentially far more difficult/sensitive test because the overall difficulty for the top students could be ratcheted up further – for example, throwing in more advanced trig and calculus level questions for students who had aced all the algebra questions. </p>
<p>There would probably be a small number of students who would need accommodations because they couldn’t use the computer – students with vision problems or physical disabilities, for example – but I think for the most part they would be students with visible, physical disabilities. </p>
<p>A side benefit is that students could probably get instant scoring – and the whole thing could be arranged by individual appointment rather than specific Saturday testing dates, since the computerized testing would be individualized and tailored to each student.</p>
This is exactly the problem. What about the other (hypothetical) student in the class who, because he was not doing well, studied hard to prepare for the exam, knew the material, but also misread the question. The prof did not invite to him to retake the test because he assumed did not know the material. (This would necessarily be the case unless EVERY student who missed that question was invited to re-test). So, no, this was not fair - your son got an accomodation that was not given to others.</p>
<p>Calmom, are you sure that adopting the format referred to as Computer Adaptive Test would be a better solution for the SAT? All this time, I thought that ETS/TCB were trying to launch a better model for the GRE. </p>
<p>PS ETS had to postpone the unveiling of a new GRE.</p>
<p>We seem to spend a great deal of time and money on education geared to those who need special help. Aside from a few questionable “AP” classes we do very little to educate the advanced students.</p>
<p>I have never disagreed with this sentiment, edad. In fact in this very thread I reference this in particular: the neglect of the special needs of the highly achieving student. That would include monetary neglect. What way too many people, included otherwise very educated people, do not understand, is how widespread LD can be among the <em>gifted</em> and the <em>advanced learner</em>, not just the average student, the mediocre student, the slow-witted student. Giftedness & high achievement are of course not the same thing, but either can be affected by LD.</p>
<p>You have a good point. In this particular case, students had to set up the problem according to the directions of the question, so it was easy for the prof to see that my S had misread the question and therefore set up the problem wrong. And so the wrong answer followed from that. I’m assuming that other students set up the problem correctly but answered it wrong.</p>
<p>But it is my experience that college profs are far more willing to accommodate students than many posters give them credit for, because they are not interested, ultimately, in failing kids but in helping them learn and evaluating as accurately as they can whether they have done so.</p>
<p>drb, “So, no, this was not fair”. Wow you must live in a tough and competitive world. I would rather think that Marite’s son had the good fortune of having a professor who cares about students. In any case, one would never know if the prof had contacted more students, and if the misreading is widespread, I would think the prof may actually announced it in class.</p>
<p>Marite, I think its terrific that the prof realized your son’s error and gave him a chance for a “do-over”. Hopefully, he does the same for all his students. </p>
<p>But, that’s not the same thing as giving one student extra time to check his work while collecting all the other students’ papers on time - then grading on the same scale.</p>
<p>You still don’t get it. Most of the very gifted do need special help to realize their gifts. They are the highly verbal kid who physically can’t write, for instance. They get so frustrated they tear up their spelling assignments and throw them on the floor and cry, because they had a mental vision for how they would make a great cohesive story out of those words and their hands can’t do it. Their teachers think they are slow because they can’t make basic sentences out of a few spelling words and so it goes.</p>
<p>I agree. I was trying to address points made by posters who argued that in college students would not get the accommodations that parents seek for them on the SAT. My experience is that college profs are far more accommodating, much more interested in finding what the students know rather than what they should know but do not.</p>
<p>Another example: A large number of my S’s math and science finals have been take-home, with one week to work on the problems. One final was in class but was open books and students were told to bring in one page of notes as well as the textbook.
For a humanities final, the prof sent a list of questions from which he would select a few for the in-class exam. Students would have a choice of several questions. I really liked this format, since this allowed the prof to ask questions based on the whole semester’s lectures and readings and to ask students to synthesize rather than merely regurgitate what they had read. In fact, the questions turned out to be quite hard!</p>
<p>These are the kinds of exams that depend less on managing one’s time or memorizing; they also limit the silly mistakes that students make under pressure (such as S made in the exam I mentioned earlier).</p>
<p>In my opinion, the SAT has too much of a “gotcha” dimension to it besides the time pressure.</p>
Why not? Suppose they just launched it as an option open to any students who chose – you could sign up for the Computer version or the paper version, or even take both at different times if you chose. The market would ultimately determine which test was preferred.</p>
<p>I think it’s worth exploring. Not like they listen to us. But the colleges do because some of the admissions people figured out who I was on CC.</p>
<p>Didn’t ETS explore the computerized option? That was the idea behind computerizing the PLUS test for the lower grades Talent Searches. I thought the idea was that eventually, ETS would computerize the SAT as well. Then came the threat of the UC system to do away with the SAT, and CB and ETS focused on revamping the SAT and adding an essay portion.</p>
<p>Kids with LD or ADHD or Asperger are hardly a monolithic group and not all need accomodations. A few years ago the top scorer on the PSAT’s at our school was a boy with Asperger who had no accomodations.</p>
<p>I am in favor of trying to level the playing field so that all kids have a chance to show what they know with a reasonable degree of accuracy.</p>
<p>But, from my own experience I think it is important to keep a big picture in mind. When I was finishing my residency training my new intern was a young woman with dyslexia. She had received excellent remediation and accomodations both and had been a successful college and medical school student as she was bright and worked very hard.</p>
<p>But internship is different, there are very few ways to accomodate slower writing speed, mild organizational issues or the array of residual issues which a young person with a learning or attention issue MIGHT have. After years of working hard and being told she could make it if she had the right help and worked hard, there was nothing she or we could do to help her to juggle, record, prioritize and basically increase her efficiency and working rate as she needed to- we tried, we tried with every trick and shortcut which any of us had learned, and it simply was a no-go. It was very sad for her, and for those of us who really wanted to see her succeed. </p>
<p>The exams, whether SAT or MCAT or whatever are but one hurdle that a student with a learning or attention issue might face as the demands increase in complexity and volume.</p>
There was actually a huge stink about just this issue a few years back. I can’t remember how it was resolved. (Not a bad hip, but someone who wanted to be in a tournament, but who couldn’t walk the course.)</p>
<p>Calmom, I’d forgotten about the computer test options. When I took the architecture licensing exam you could do it that way, but I was too chicken to try!</p>
<p>The point is that the SAT test has essentially become a barrier and neither the test format nor the content is particularly related to the demands of college. It doesn’t test IQ; it doesn’t test accumulated knowledge; and it is not a particularly good way of determining likelihood of college success. To the extent that it tests on processing speed or focus on detail, it is testing skills that are not particularly important to college success, where the focus is much more on exploring topics in depth and being able to get a sense of the big picture and relationships of ideas and concepts. I mean, college is not a quiz show, and the SAT tends to favor quiz show level performance. </p>
<p>In my family, the irony is that my dyslexic son did well on standardized tests, with no accommodations, whereas it was my early-reading, highly verbal daughter who somehow hit a wall when it came to SAT-type tests, though she did really well with AP exams. Since I happen to have a professionally determined IQ test for my d, I have some documentation of the fact that she tests below her ability. Fortunately, her personal testing fiasco did not stand in the way of college admissions – but it definitely is frustrating to look at a test which one knows is not truly reflective of the student’s abilities, and have so much weight put on the outcome. </p>
<p>My suggestion as to the computerized format is just looking for a way to develop a better test, as opposed to finding ways to accommodate students in order that they can perform better on a bad test. Personally, I feel that until the test can somehow overcome the economic correlation – the direct linear relationship between test scores and parental income – the test remains nothing more than a short-hand way of sorting the haves from the have nots in a college admissions system that claims to be “need blind” but is structured to favor wealth and privilege. A truly merit-based, exam-based system would rely on subject-matter tests – such as the A levels used in the UK. </p>
<p>That was pretty much the direction the UC system was trying to take as well; they were looking at developing their own entrance exam until the CB scrambled to meet some of their objections. </p>
<p>But obviously as long as colleges continue to use the bad test, then parents and students are going to want to find ways to level the playing field.</p>
<p>Calmom, if the UC system was indeed working on developing their own test --a fact I doubt has any foundation beyond the wildest of speculations-- all of should let a huge collective sigh of relief go. Based on objective accounts of the UC-TCB saga, we can thank the Atkinson for the “positive” changes and laugh at how the UC morons were played by Gaston and his boys. </p>
<p>For the record, when it comes to the SAT, there is a lot more than the economic correlation: in addition to the direct linear relationship between test scores and parental income, it is necessary to add the direct relationship to the level of parental education.</p>
<p>From my vantage point, I would like to believe that, if the SAT was really as horrendous as presented herein, it should be a cinch for someone to develop a better mousetrap. Yet, what do we have: a poor cousin version named the ACT and … nothing else! For all its glib, Fairtest has yet to provide a single constructive idea, which is not a large surprise considering the absolute lack of credibility and related training of its leader. </p>
<p>I am ALL IN FAVOR of a better test, but I have yet to see it. Simply stated, there is nothing out there that is better. And, fwiw, I do not think that the CAT technology used for the GRE would aleviate any of the worries about the haves and have-nots. Quite to the contrary, beating the CAT is again a matter of understanding how the test is designed. Taking the GRE without a basic understanding of what to expect is a recipe for disaster. Humm, isn’t that deja vu all over again? </p>