Ajenae Amos
November 14, 2013
Education Essay

Education sets the foundation for our future. It determines which colleges we attend what job we obtain. Education is the key to the future. Standardized tests are supposed to give colleges a yardstick to compare students for entry. However, that is not the case. Standardized tests (SAT’s) are not a good measure of a student’s aptitude because scorers do not actually read what’s written, it is very out dated and students they are biased to students of minorities. “All SAT measures is how well you take the SAT. It does not reveal how smart of a person you are” says Amanda Chan, a junior at Central York High School. The test is designed to assess a student’s academic “readiness” before college. When students take the SAT, they are under the impression that scorers take the time to actually read what’s written and actually assessed on their ability to write about a specific topic and their mathematic and English skills. However, after reading an article, it explained that scorers are expected to spend no longer than two minutes reading each essay. In fact, if they read more than ten in five minutes, their pay increases. Student’s writing tests are skimmed and not actually read. Amanda Chan’s statement “It does not reveal how smart of a person you are” is extremely true. If scorers do not actually take the time to look at the student’s ability to write, then their true academic performance is not accurately assessed. The Scholastic Aptitude Tests (SAT) was created in 1926 by Carl C. Brigham. “The first official SAT exam was administered on June 23, 1926 to 8,040 students and was primarily multiple-choice” says pbs.org. Today, in 2013, the SAT tests that are administered to high school students across the nation have a three section test: Math, Writing and critical reading. The test administered in 1926 consisted of nine sub-tests or subjects which were: Definitions, Arithmetical Problems, Classification, Artificial language, Antonyms, Number Series, Analogies, Logical Inference, and Paragraph Reading. The difference in topics mentioned above show how the test has evolved over time. Although the subjects have changed to fit the time period, the method of scoring and the ranges have not. Tests are still measured on an 1800 and 2400 scale. With the test being 86 years old, many people such as parents (mine to be specific) feel that there should be a new test created to fit the current curriculum status. “The richer you are, the higher the SAT score.” That is just one of many forms of minority bias statements. Amanda Chan, a junior a Central York High School stated that the more money you have, the higher the SAT score because parents can often “buy” their students a higher SAT score. This is often because parents tend to