BUCKLEY, Wash. — Two sections of the June 6 SAT administered across the country will not be scored due to a misprint, but test makers told students the scores will be just as reliable as those given to students who took the test on a different day.
The College Board said about 487,000 students registered for the test on June 6 and may be affected.
The final reading section of the students’ test booklets showed they had 25 minutes to complete the section, while proctors had the correct version in their booklets, indicating only 20 minutes for the section.
Because some students were assigned to take their final math section while others took the final reading section, neither will be scored.
This mistake only affects SAT I tests taken on Saturday, June 6.
“I’m frustrated. I’m upset. It’s not OK,” said Syrus Aird, who is a rising senior at White River High School in Buckley, Wash.
Aird said he had not planned on taking the SAT again, but he would now like a retake.
Aird said he knew that “If I mess this up, I don’t get into a good college.” He told KIRO 7 he never imagined the test makers would be the ones to "mess up."
The College Board assured students the scores are reliable, but that anyone wanting a retake could register for the October test for free. Families need to inform them by emailing sat@info.collegeboard.org that they would like the registration fee waived.
Students have until Sept. 3 to register for the Oct. 3 test >> https://sat.collegeboard.org/register/sat-us-dates
“I was going to take the October test anyway so that way I’ve got two tests, but the issue that’s happening right now – the ordeal – it shouldn’t have happened in the first place,” said Nick Bowers, who also took the test that day.
Bowers said he was upset at the way the College Board informed them. He said he found out through friends and social media before finding the official emailing, which mentioned the error in the second paragraph, after assuring students their test scores would come out on time.
All SAT exams already incorporate one additional, unscored section. That section is typically understood to be between sections 2 and 7. The sections discarded from the June 6 exam are sections 8 and 9.
Therefore, students who took the test on June 6 will have 7 out of 10 sections scored. Writing sections were not affected by this.
The College Board wrote on their website:
“The SAT consists of three Tests: Reading, Writing, and Math – with each test having multiple sections. To accommodate the wide range of incidents that can impact a testing experience, the SAT is designed to collect enough information to provide valid and reliable scores even with an additional unscored section within a test. From fire drills and power outages to mistiming and disruptive behavior, school-based test administrations can be fragile, so our assessments are not.
We have deliberately constructed each test to include three equal sections with roughly the same level of difficulty. If one of the three sections is jeopardized, the correlation among sections is sufficient to be able to deliver reliable scores.”
KIRO 7 asked the University of Washington and Washington State University how they would consider scores from the June 6 SAT I.
A spokesperson for WSU said that they have been assured by the College Board that the scores are reliable. However:
"Should we find that there are problems associated with the testing on that date, we would expect them to affect only a small population of applicants and we would take those problems into consideration in qualifying a candidate for admission. Also, SAT scores are only one of several indicators considered by WSU in granting admission."
KIRO
