SAT stands for Scholastic Aptitude Test, which is an examination is created by the College Board. ACT stands for American College Testing, a second test created by Testmasters. Both of these tests are designed to check students skill levels and use as applications for college admission. Following the Huffington Post, it said that “around 800 U.S. colleges and universities are no longer use SAT or ACT as their requirement for admission” (Huffington Post). However, the SAT and ACT bring lots of benefits to students and colleges. Therefore, colleges should use SAT and ACT as part of their application process, because the SAT/ACT gave the college detailed what the students are good at. Even though, many students abuse the benefit of taking the test multiple time, the test still created more opportunities for students who did not do very well in high school; and …show more content…
In fact, most private colleges only takes the top 10% of the class to get into their colleges. However, there are lots of students in one class, so it’s pretty hard and competitive to get into the high rank. Added to that, following the Huffington Post, there are more and more students are taking the SAT, even though their score failed to improve. Specifically, “a record 1.7 million students from the class of 2015 took the SAT, while 1.67 million did the same from the class of 2014 and 1.65 million from the class of 2011” (Klein, The Huffington Post). This shows that many students’ effort endlessly in taking the exam and how they saw the SAT as their second chances for college ticket. After each test, the test results always provided exam takers in detail where they got missed and in what category they need to improve. Therefore, as the more test they take, the more they get improvement in their scores also their
The Specialized High School Admissions Test (SHSAT) may have its faults, but it is by far the most efficient option.
A study conducted by Charles Rooney a member of the National Center for Fair and Open testing states that, "[More than 275 colleges and universities across the United States, acting on the belief that "test scores do not equal merit," do not use the SAT or the ACT to make admissions decisions about some part or all of their freshmen.]"
One of the main reasons that colleges have stopped looking at SAT scores is because there has recently been much speculation about the test being biased against certain groups, these groups being African Americans, Latinos, women, and those of a lower socioeconomic status. Also, some colleges are not placing an emphasis on the test anymore because the College Board has admitted that the SAT is designed so that only one half of those taking the test answer correctly. (Alfe, 2002)
According to Robert Jackson in . “Retooling education: Testing and the Liberal Arts” Colleges who changed their admission by making the SAT optional have directed their aims into a more high school grade based admission. This solution is the only true measurement we have at the moment and it is a better measurement than the SAT states Robert Jackson. The writer also goes on to say scholastic aptitude should be abolished, as it has no true value or indicator of student’s ability. A more precise measurement based on four years of schoolwork is a pretty good indicator of student’s ability. It gives equal playing field for all students from their freshmen year in high school until their senior year in high school. Students have equal opportunities to perform giving them four years to accomplish good grades for college admissions. this method gives unprivileged students the opportunity to go to college who previously could not attend college because of SAT Prep cost. Also this method benefits college admissions by providing an indicator on how students will perform in college classes making it easy to admit or deny
There are preparation classes to take that help students practice for the SAT and ACT but it cost over $200 per session. To some people it $200 may not seem like much, but to others, including myself is pricey. Just to register for the test costs around $50. Students can retake the test as many times as possible but, again, every registration cost money. It has been proven that students who have a higher economic status score higher on test because they are able to afford more expensive test preps and retake the test to score higher. (Westlund). "President Obama noted in January, 'Standardized tests are not standardized.'Using the example of his own two daughters who have been receiving advice on the SAT since 7th grade, the President recognized that the 'degree of advance preparation' that many kids get 'tilts the playing field'"(Westlund). President Obama said it himself, the more a parent pays the better the score. Not only are these tests costly but also don't represent a person's ability to succeed in college.
Many students feel stressed out when having to take standardized testing. According to Kaplan, colleges are relying too much on the SAT and ACT. They are using a long test that becomes equally weighted to years of school. That seems to be a little lopsided. A student can do well through out all high school and then score badly on the SAT or ACT and ruin all of the hard work that the student put forward in order to acquire good grades. That can alter the students lives by making them have to...
"Study finds high SAT and ACT scores might not spell success at college." PBS. PBS, n.d. 18 Feb 2014. Web. 17 May 2014.
These standardized tests are used by schools because they find that it is an easy way to test a student’s ability. However, the issue in doing this is for example, the ACT is all multiple choice. Exams such as these do not give the option to include worded feedback to show that you at least know something about the subject. Multiple choice exams have this problem, they can’t test the information that a person fully knows, it only tests whether they chose the right answer or possibly just guessed it. With only a slew of multiple choice questions it can be easy to get a “good” score or a “bad” score. That’s why these tests are flawed, the results they show don’t prove anything or really show anything for that matter.
Thousands of students around the country and around the world will be preparing for the SAT and ACT tests while trying to maintain a high GPA. These tests will potentially have a significant impact on students' lives. Some will be taking these tests for the second or even third time to get that 1500 out of 1600 or that 33 out of 36, that they long desire. These flawed tests are not truly able to measure how well students will perform in college as they are supposedly used to predict. A single test that students have to wake up for at six, seven in the morning on a Saturday and travel to some random location to take a difficult test should not impact the student's chance of getting into college, let alone predict how well they will do in college.
Standardized testing has been proven to be biased towards those of ethnic and socioeconomic disadvantaged groups. Wealthy students become more prepared for standardized tests through better life experiences, such as top-quality schools and test prep tutors. Steven Syverson implies that students with high SAT scores are presumed to be “bright” and encouraged to consider the most selective colleges, with no regard to their academic performance in high school (57). Those students that were considered elite, but did not perform well their parents suggested to admission counselors that they were “not challenged” in high school (Syverson 57). According to Marchant and Paulson, race, parent education, and family income were found to account as much as 94% of the variance in scores among states (85:62). Students that belong to multiple disadvantage categories suffered greatly in the scoring criteria. The majority of students with socioeconomic disadvantages are discouraged from attending college. However, those that choose to further their education are more than likely the first ones in their family to attend college. Due to the large debate involving the admissions process using the SAT score, more colleges have adopted the SAT Optional policy because it is “consistent with their institutional mission and
“Man masters nature not by force but by understanding. This is why science has succeeded where magic failed: because it has looked for no spell to cast over nature”. From the beginning of time man and nature has been in conflict with one another because, as a whole, there is no cooperating. Each one tirelessly wants its way. The Man is fighting for dominance and nature w never yielding its authority. In American Literature, many authors illustrate this theme in their writing. Specifically the writers Jack London in The Law Of Life, Stephen Crane The Open Boat and Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Fin. Each explores the relationship between humans and nature but with slightly different methods. Mark Twain uses nature in a realistic way, Jack London in a naturalistic way and Stephen Crane constitutes a combination of both.
Every day, more and more attempts of banning books and taking away the rights of our First Amendment get violated. The challenging of a book is the attempt to remove or restrict materials, and the banning is the removal of these materials. I believe that books should not be banned for these reasons.
Thus for standardized testing to be legitimate, that statement must be true, otherwise standardized testing would be a very expensive and pointless test. In a study conducted by William Hiss, he sampled 33 universities and over 123,000 students and concluded that SAT scores are a poor predictor of college performance which he defines as college culminated GPA over the years. By plotting a scatterplot that compares college GPA with SAT scores, he found no reliable correlation between SAT scores and college GPA. In fact, studies undertaken by the College Board indicate that the SAT adds only modestly to the prediction of student’s success. Interestingly, Hiss found out that high school GPA is the best predictor of college GPA. According to Hiss, “kids who had low or modest test scores, but good high school grades, did better in college than those with good scores but modest grades.” (Hiss) Hiss elaborated on this saying “a pattern of hard work, discipline and curiosity in high school shows up ‘as highly predictive, in contrast to what they do in three or four hours on a particular Saturday morning in a testing room.’”(Hiss) Looking at high school grades shows much more information that just how well the student did in a particular class. It shows whether the students were challenging themselves with advance placement class and
Although the SAT seems like a good measure and is used by many colleges and universities, it is not a good way to measure a student's ability and should be abolished because it has some problems. The ideas that show the problems are the not-balance fact between black students and white students that have taken the SAT, the fact that shows that a student's parent's income affects a student's SAT score, the fact about the incorrectness of the SAT scores that some students took in October 2005, and about the score which does not measure someone's ability or future.
What makes a good person good? According to WikiHow, "We should learn to define our own morals ourselves. One of the simplest ways to do so is to love others, and treat them as you would like to be treated. Try to think of others before yourself. Even doing small things daily will greatly enrich and improve your life, and the lives of others around you." This quote shows us what we need to do in order to be what society thinks as, “good". In order to be a good person, you have to do good and moral things in your society consistently. However people might think that by doing one good thing once in a while will automatically make you a “good person”, but in reality it doesn’t.