Education Law

SAT results can be deceiving at first glance

SAT scores for the Class of 2010 were released this week and at first glance BoardBuzz was not encouraged by the results. Overall scores remained relatively stable even as the number of minority students taking the test continued to grow, according to the College Board?s Total Group Report: College-Bound Seniors 2010.

Yes, overall the results didn?t look very encouraging but SAT results can be deceiving. That?s because not all students take the SAT. Since it is a college entrance exam typically only those students expecting to go onto college take the exam so SAT scores are not a great indicator of overall school performance. However, more and more districts, and even some same states, are now requiring or at least paying for their high school students to take the SAT so more students how may not have taken the SAT in the past are now taking it. This may be one reason why scores have remained steady for the past couple of years. So may be the fact that a more poor and minority students who have traditionally scored lower are now taking the exam.

So when you when you compare the SAT score of your school, district, or state make sure you look to see what percent of their students took the SAT. If a school scored higher than yours it may not be an indication of the quality of the school. It may be that in the other school only a few top students took the SAT while at your school all students took it, even those not expecting to go onto college. So such comparisons would not provide an accurate comparison of the quality of the two schools. This is something that gets lost this time of year when newspapers print SAT results.

This isn?t to say that SAT scores are not important to look at. They are. They are one of the few high school level indicators of college readiness. However, the results just need to be put in their proper context so school and district leaders have an accurate understanding of how prepared their students actually are for college so they can make more informed decisions.

To learn more about how to use SAT scores to evaluate the quality of your schools check out the Center for Public Education?s Good Measures for Good Schools-Are our students ready for college?

For a greater breakdown of the results from this year?s SAT check out the Center for Public Education?s The EDifier.

Full post as published by BoardBuzz: NSBA's Daily Weblog on September 16, 2010 (boomark / email).