New SAT To Bring Back 1600-Point Scale -- With Optional Essay
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AUSTIN, Texas -- The venerable SAT college admissions test will look very different in spring 2016. And, according to the new test's architect, there will be "no more mysteries."
The essay will be optional, and will be based on a source document included in the test. The top test score will be 1,600 -- as it was before 2005, when the writing section and essay were added. The test's two mandatory sections, "evidence-based reading and writing," and math, and will take up to three hours to complete. The essay will take up to 50 minutes, and will be scored separately.
Some math questions will prohibit calculator use. Students will no longer lose points for wrong answers. The test will be available both in print and digitally. The price hasn't been announced.
David Coleman, who in 2012 became president of the nonprofit company College Board that owns the SAT, will present the broad outline of the test redesign in a speech in Austin on Wednesday, part of the SXSWedu conference. The changes are meant to mitigate the unfair test-prep culture the SAT has engendered, to foster more meaningful learning in school, and to make the testing process more open, Coleman said in the prepared text of his speech. More details will be released in mid-April.
"We plan to make an exam that is clearer and more open than any in our history," Coleman said in the speech. "We need to get rid of the sense of mystery and dismantle