The SAT administered on June 6 had a misprint which gave students the incorrect amount of time on one of the last three sections.This affected either a 20-minute Reading section or a 20-minute Math section. The College Board’s response has been to say that it simply will not count these mistimed sections in scoring the June tests.
What does this mean for students who took the June SAT?
While this is perhaps the best possible response to this unfortunate situation, we do think that it carries repercussions that parents and students should know about.
The College Board claims this won’t affect scoring, but it will. It will create wider gaps in the curve. Under normal circumstances, 67 questions contribute to the Critical Reading score and 54 to the Math score. Now, for the June test, 48 questions will be used to decide the Reading score and 38 to decide the Math score. Effectively, this means that instead of having, say, nine possible scores between 700 and 800 on the Reading, we may have five or six. Thus the June SAT curve will probably resemble the PSAT curve, which is quite steep and makes it harder for students to achieve top scores. Two questions wrong on the Reading may mean a score of 760 and two questions wrong on the Math may mean a score of 740.
We really feel for the many students who have been working hard to prepare for this SAT, and we are happy to try to answer parent and student questions about scores, test preparation, and admissions. You can e-mail us here.
