Over the years, online standardized testing has become much more prevalent in schools, both to the dismay and relief of many across the country. State-required assessments, courses’ final exams, and both SAT, and ACT are all mostly online. As the SAT draws near for Westwood juniors, questions about online vs. on-paper tests naturally arise.
The SAT is already a stressful enough ordeal for students, parents, and teachers alike. Students enroll in SAT prep classes, study tirelessly, and more. As we all know, a student’s SAT score affects the attractiveness of their application to most universities. Making the SAT an online test allows it to be universally unaccommodating to many students’ testing abilities does not ease the stress or provide equal opportunities for good scores for all students.
While for some, online standardized testing is a better method, a 2015 study conducted by the Economics of Education Review showed that students who took a test on paper performed as if they had five more months of preparation compared to those who took the test online.
Although this may simply be due to students being unaccustomed to this method of testing, there is no denying that scores for standardized tests go down significantly once taken online. Online standardized testing is not a risk that districts should take, especially for the SAT. Students should be given the choice between taking the SAT online or on paper. While this method may be tedious and inefficient for the grading process, schooling, its facilities, its requirements should be adaptive to all students.
The change to online formatting makes the SAT easier, which is widely believed to promote harsher grading. Although this is a plausible belief, SAT scoring is said to remain the same. The digital SAT will still be graded on the 400 to 1600 scale. For math and reading, it will also still have a maximum score of 800. College Board also clarifies that the SAT is not graded on a curve, since students take different versions of the test. Although keeping the grading system unchanged is beneficial and based solely on student performance, not all students benefit from this online method.
All in all, students are evidently stressed and pressured enough about the prospect of the SAT. Students should undoubtedly be permitted to choose between an online or a traditional paper format. Students perform differently in each format and every student is different. A one-size-fits-all approach is not the answer. Schools should work to be more accommodating to their students and ensure every student has an equal shot at academic success.
