The digital format will be easier to administer, the College Board said, because schools will no longer have to worry about shipping or receiving the tests. Cossio said it “kept her focused.” Students can decide whether SAT is worthwhile A countdown clock was also available on the screen.
Instead, she opened the app and logged in. She didn’t have to bubble in the individual letters for her name at the top of her exam booklet.
Cossio said she was told proctors could see her screen. Students were still spaced apart, and proctors were in the room. She borrowed her father’s iPad and headed to a nearby high school to take the SAT. (The College Board connected Cossio with a USA TODAY reporter.)Ĭossio had taken the PSAT, essentially a practice version of the exam given to students earlier in their high school careers, with traditional paper and pencil. The junior at South County High School in Lorton, Virginia, was part of a pilot group of students who took the SAT digitally last year, with the chance of winning a $100 gift card. Natalia Cossio, 16, has only ever taken the SAT digitally, though she has been hearing about the test since she was in middle school. Students will be able to use calculators during the entire math section, an expansion from previous versions of the test. The reading sections will be shorter and more closely related to material students would likely read in college. "That allows for more efficient testing to get the same assessment of the skills and knowledge," Rodriguez said. That means the test changes based on the students' answers, with the goal of reducing the time students spend answering questions that are either too easy or too hard. The digital test is shorter because it relies on adaptive testing, said Priscilla Rodriguez, a College Board vice president. Not the first tweak to the SAT: College Board eliminates SAT's optional essay and subject tests About 2.2 million high schoolers in the class of 2020 took the exam, but that number plummeted to 1.5 million for the class of 2021, as requirements loosened and pandemic-related closures affected the test's availability. According to Fair Test: National Center for Fair & Open Testing, a nonprofit critical of the SAT, 80% of the roughly 2,300 four-year colleges aren't requiring the exam for high school students in the graduating class of 2022.
The test-optional movement started before the pandemic, but the coronavirus shutdowns spurred even more universities to pause or drop their testing requirements. International students will start testing virtually in 2023.įor decades, the SAT – or its competitor, the ACT – was required to apply to traditional colleges. The tests' ubiquity have faded in recent years as more colleges have ditched the exams as a prerequisite for admissions. The shift to online exams won't happen until 2024 for American students. The College Board, the organization that administers the SAT, PSAT and other standardized tests, announced the change Tuesday. Put down the pencils and grab your laptop: The SAT, one of the nation’s most commonly used college-entrance exams, is going digital.