EDUCATION - Average SAT Scores Drop

"Average Scores for SAT Tests Drop as Pool of Students Who Take Test Widens" PBS Newshour 9/25/2012

Excerpt

SUMMARY: Many parents and teachers have looked to SAT scores as a measure for the quality of education students receive. This year, national average scores on SAT reading and writing tests edged down while math scores remained stagnant. Ray Suarez talks to College Board's Jim Montoya and University of Oregon's Roger Thompson for more.

RAY SUAREZ (Newshour): The latest scores are out for the high school class of 2012, the new freshmen starting work at colleges across the country. And the news is not good. The College Board, which oversees the SAT, reports that 57 percent of seniors do not seem ready for college based on their test scores.

The board also reported that reading scores have fallen to their lowest point in four decades. Out of a perfect score of 800 in each category, the mean reading score fell slightly to 491, writing dropped by a point to 481, and math dropped one point to 505.

Since 2008, reading and writing scores have dipped, while math has remained stable. What do these scores tell us about students' readiness?

We get two views. Jim Montoya is a vice president of the College Board. He is a former dean of admissions for Stanford University.

And Roger Thompson is the vice provost for enrollment management at the University of Oregon. The state system has more than 24,000 students; 20,000 of them are undergraduates.

Significant excerpt

JIM MONTOYA, College Board: Well, what we are to conclude is that students need to take more rigorous courses in high school.

We have to have higher expectations of our students.

What we know is this, that of those students who complete a core curriculum, four years of English, at least three years of mathematics, at least three years of science, and at least three years of social science, compared to those who students who didn't complete a core curriculum, those students completing a core curriculum scored 144 points higher on the SAT.

PERSONAL ASIDE: 'In a galixy far, far away,' when I when to high school, I took a 'core' curriculum AND college prep courses.