You’re sweating as you shake while you adjust your bubble sheet to circle your next answer. You can’t stop your mind from racing about what would happen if you bomb this exam. Will this be the end of your high school career? Will your parents throw a fit of rage if you get too many questions wrong? You are starting to overthink about whether you should’ve picked C or B for question 2.
Testing anxiety is a real challenge that many adolescents face whether it be the midterms of your science class, the Rregents you think you might fail because you think you haven’t studied nearly as much as you should, or a standardized test. Testing anxiety can lead to an increased heart rate, panic attacks or even shaking as you bubble that next multiple-choice question or race to finish showing your work.
Every year the weight of the SAT looms over the shoulders of juniors among schools all over America as they rush to prepare for a test that would determine their future. The SAT stands for Standards Admissions Test. The SAT dates back to the 1926 and was developed from an Army IQ test. The entry-level exam for college decisions happens every year for juniors in March for students in America.
The purpose of the SAT is to measure a student’s knowledge they have accumulated throughout their high school years, then colleges look at the students’ performance to make decisions. According to the Princeton Review, the SAT serves to “provide colleges with one common data point that can be used to compare all applicants.”
The SAT has been ridiculed for years for its ability to assess students’ knowledge. In actuality, there’s a correlation between parents’ financial situations and test scores. The question raised was if the SAT actually measures a student’s real capabilities or if this is a competition of hours accumulated to prepare for the day of the test.
The experience that resembles the classroom is frequently the most expensive. While many students would prefer a classroom experience when it comes to test prep this option is inaccessible for many. The more time that a student has devoted to studying the better their score will get on their practices. An in-person program course which is one of the most beneficiary options on SAT improvement scores could be anywhere from $800 to $1,800 the source that covers the investments to prepare for the SAT, College Investor.
The unfair advantage that bridges the gap between students who have hundreds of thousands of dollars to spend on test prep. “If you’re rich you are essentially guaranteed to have enough money, you can pay for the best of tutors and you can have the access to the best of study resources and it plays a significant role in how someone performs on a test like the SAT,” said Kert Turley, a junior who will be taking the SAT within the upcoming months.
While SAT prep can ease stress about how one will perform on the SAT,. the money aspect of preparation is not the only issue that bubbles to the surface of contributing to testing for students. Testing anxiety is real and it is defined by The Learning Center of North Carolina as “a combination of physical symptoms and emotional reactions that interfere with your ability to perform well on tests.” This overwhelming anxiety regarding test taking typically has to do with worries about the result of the exam.
SAT scores similar to ACT scores could display the increasing gap in disparities based on demographics such as a student’s race and the income of their family. The College Investor also presents that the advantage of the most expensive SAT prep would be, “In-person learning opens up the opportunity to ask questions, receive direct feedback, and have one-on-one time with your instructor. It’s well-researched that having an in-person learning experience increases your engagement with the material and can lead to a more successful outcome.”
iSchool junior Haifa opened up about the intersectionality aspect of preparation: “It is ignorant to assume that every student will have the same access to resources. There will be limitations and the wealth gap set between students is linked with the gap of scores between students.”
The Heritage Foundation focuses on specific topics that solutions can be developed for that the country of America faces. The foundation found interest in inadequate educational opportunities for students in lower-income housing areas. While many wonder where the connection may be drawn between red-lining used in the past to allocate loan resources, the foundation observed the similarity between the past up to now. According to The Heritage Foundation, “to be a strong similarity between 1930s-era redlining maps and the attendance zone boundaries within school district borders.” Red-lining dates back through history, however, “ the ripple effects on education are still felt today.” Red-lining was a practice, not necessarily literal drawing but prohibiting access to loans based on the wealth of the neighborhood. Factors and stereotypes like race played a huge role in discrimination when it came to economic resources. The difficulties that students from low-income backgrounds will face are the disparity of having to essentially teach themselves if their schooling system fails to do so. Red-lining has persistent effects on education style and educational opportunities that are accessible to students.
Access to public school is more often by the zone boundaries. Even the DOE states that most middle and elementary school students in NYC will attend their zone school. So the performance of a certain school is a reflection of how the students within the zone are performing. In many instances, more often than not the underperforming schools tend to be in zones with lower income and lower funding allocated to the school which shows that there are limitations to educational resources. This is an indication that housing income could influence a student’s educational opportunities and learning disadvantages.
Educational opportunities give students an advantage to advance in their preparation for the SAT. A one-on-one setting like having a tutor and the student alone in the room would help to minimize distractions and allow the student to ask the tutor direct questions. However, some of the most expensive options are the ones that tend to be most resourceful, these would indefinitely be able to imrove practice and retention habits of information. For instance, students learn in a classroom setting because it helps hands-on engagement with the content. Having an instructor who can accurately explain your trouble areas is vital to building foundational learning skills for each class.
The SAT covers 4 major topics in math alone, Geometry and Trigonometry, Problem solving and Data analysis, Algebra 1 and 2, along with advanced math. All four topics are typically covered in about 3-4 years depending on the students familiarity with the curriculum from their 8th-grade to their 11th-grade classes before the SAT. In addition, the SAT has a Reading and Writing component. The writing component consists of no actual writing done by the student however, it is writing-based questions on the functions of grammar and organization of ideas.
The SAT does not contain any historical based content questions, nor any science. A student at iSchool shared, “We should get rid of the SAT because it overlooks many certain aspects of learning in high school. It can overlook students who may excel in other areas that they don’t perform on the SAT. The college admission worker can overlook many capable students who do well in other areas not covered by the test.” Mariana additionally proposed that a portion of the SAT should be an assessment of students’ abilities to incorporate evidence within their writing. She introduced the benefit of implementing a section for writing by taking a position on an argument and using evidence from sources provided to take a stance in an essay within the SAT.
The SAT is for the college board to decide between scholars based on the student’s performance on the SAT there is no right or wrong answer. The effectiveness and equity of the test are huge points that have set forth a discussion that allows people to cast doubt and judgment on the quality of the exam and the exam equity towards for test takers.
In retrospect, despite how worried you may be about the SAT, in the future when you get a job they will not look at your SAT score and deny you the job because you got lower than a 1500/1600. While studying for the SAT it is important to do what is best for you and your family in terms of what form of study helps you and financially what your family can afford. The most important piece of advice that students should take-away starting off their high school time is to get involved in programs outside of school too and extracurricular activities. Take advantage of the opportunities that the school offers for you and be sure to advocate for yourself in school for your learning path.
