Acmlm's Board - I2 Archive - World Affairs / Debate - So it's 2400 now...
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neotransotaku
Posts: 2646/4016 |
verdict is in:
Students say new SAT is too long |
Toxic
Posts: 2521/2857 |
Yeah, I'm in the marching band, wind ensemble, football team, soon to be volleyball team, and I took the PSAT, everyone at my school did.
I forget what I got. It wasn't great, but it wasn't awful. I was in the 69th percentile (LOLERS) |
neotransotaku
Posts: 2640/4016 |
Originally posted by Toxic
I dunno, I'm just worried about the whole thing in general. My mom says "all you have to do is score good on the SAT's," and it's like....thanks...lot of help.
If all you have going for your is your SAT, then you are in trouble. As long as you have other stuff to supplement your SAT score like extra cirricular (sp?) activities and stuff you should be okay. Have you taken a practice SAT yet? The system is probably different but nevertheless try it out and see what you get. From there you can judge where you need to go from there. |
hhallahh
Posts: 519/607 |
Gets you ready for the GREs. 
But really, the test was changed in response to the demands of universities (specifically, the University of California system) which attacked the old SAT for being too... formulaic. So I'd assume the changes are good, because they're what the schools wanted, because they were concerned that the old SATs weren't really a good signal of student ability. |
Toxic
Posts: 2519/2857 |
I took a sample writing portion on the Princeton Review's website, and I got a 9/12 (wtfmate?)
I dunno, I'm just worried about the whole thing in general. My mom says "all you have to do is score good on the SAT's," and it's like....thanks...lot of help. |
Banedon
Posts: 1092/1408 |
I had a problem with the verbal section of the SAT's because I forgot to memorize an entire unabridged dictionary beforehand. Seriously, I've never heard of half of those words. And I read all the time and have even written a few stories.
But now, when I say I got a 1400 (out of 1600) on the SAT, people will say "Whoa, you did badly...I thought you were supposed to be 'smart'" because they'll be thinking about the new SAT... |
neotransotaku
Posts: 2631/4016 |
As for the new format, I feel that this is fair--they ask more questions that a well-rounded person should be able to do. The analogy section to me is the most useless section of the old SAT because it basically asks you how good your vocabularly is and many americans don't need a wide vocabulary to succeed. Comprehension, basic math, and writing skills are necessary and the SAT does place focus on it.
In my opinion, SAT is nothing better than something to give colleges a starting point in evaluating students. Every univerisity in america accept a wide range of SAT scores. If only top scores got students into a university, then only a small minority would ever go to college. For my university, only 4% of the accepted class for my year had my SAT score range. Which means that it can't be the only thing they look at. But I guess one could also say I fell through the cracks? |
Colin
Posts: 7325/11302 |
Hey, some universities aren't even looking at the essay - which at least gives some students an out if they bomb on it.
I still think it's not such a big deal - like I said to Hiryuu last night, you only have 25 minutes. I doubt they're asking for a 500 word masterpiece.
(I've always found that Americans place WAY too much importance on the SAT but that's another story for another day.) |
alte Hexe
Posts: 3221/5458 |
Thank you Canada and not having these stupid standardized entrance tests! |
Anya
Posts: 30889/5337 |
Now they add writing to it.  If they had that part on the test, I think I would have done better.
But either way, I don't like it how one test (well, there's others, but this is sorta the main one) can change the course of our lives. Some people are really smart, but for whatever reason, do terrible on tests (I think there was a study on this or something). |
Grey the Stampede
Posts: 1900/3770 |
I think the changes are a bad thing.
Firstoff, I haven't taken Algebra II in three years. That's some complex stuff, and if I were to take the new SAT, I am willing to bet I'd get a reasonably poor score on the Math section simply because I'm taking calculus 2 now, and haven't had to use the quadratic formula seriously in two years. I wouldn't remember the finer points because my head would be filled with psychotic equations about derivatives and integrals. Theoretically, a person in a math class four levels below me could get a higher score just because he or she was talking about it yesterday in their math class, whereas I was scraping by it three years ago. I guess that's why SATIIs exist, but colleges look at the SATI anyway.
The entire test is too subjective. Including a writing test is not going to help. People have extremely differing opinions and experiences in their high school career, and trying to standardize all of that is just going to hurt in the long run.
The good part about the SAT is that it is graded by a computer, and the computer sees every test the exact same way. If the new SAT is graded even in small part by a human, a bias WILL exist, no matter what happens. It is impossible for no bias to exist in someone's thoughts, and the graders will NOT see the tests the same way or grade them on the same scale. If the teacher is tired or energetic, if he or she is feeling forgiving or merciless, that all affects what happens. |
Ranko
Posts: 58/133 |
Starting this Saturday...
So those that are planning on taking an SAT anytime soon, you might have an easier time getting a 1600 because now the maximum score is 2400 since a writing addition has been added.
My only wonder is if this is a smart idea or not. The test is lengthened so you'll probably be likely more subjected to burn out and then you've got the universities in general having to convert to this...
On the high side, it would be a bit more broad now, considering all it was before was reading and math...even though writing is really only a stone's throw from reading in the overall sense.
Thoughts? |
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