RIP the 2400-point SAT score: 2005 – 2016.
The College Board announced major revisions to the SAT today, the most surprising being that the essay is now optional. Anyone who graduated high school from around 2006 to the present wrote an essay in hand-crippling detail; very soon, that’ll be a thing of the past. High schoolers will also no longer penalized for incorrect answers—LAME—and the questioning is more “practical.”
Adios, too, to “SAT” words like “prevaricator” and “sagacious.” In an effort to better mimic the skills needed in the real world, the College Board is adding in truly meaningless and horrible corporate buzzwords like “synthesis.” From the AP:
One of the biggest changes is that the extra penalty for wrong answers, which discouraged guessing, will be eliminated. And some vocabulary words will be replaced with words such as “synthesis” and “empirical” that are used more widely in classrooms and in work settings.
“By changing the exam’s focus, we change the learning and work the SAT invites. Today, many students who are terrified they will be tested on lots of SAT words have one recourse: flashcards,” President David Coleman said. “Every educator knows flashcards are not the best way to build real word knowledge, but when the SAT rolls around they become the royal road. Students stop reading and start flipping.”
The changes will roll out in 2016, so this year’s ninth graders will be the first to take it their junior year. The youngsters will also be able to complete the test on their laptops, which I guess was inevitable, but DID YOU KNOW WE HAD TO WRITE A PARAGRAPH IN CURSIVE?
Kids these days and their penmanship. Get off my lawn.