Changes to be Made to SAT [POLL]

The popular college admission exam the SAT will be changing in the next two years and putting more of an emphasis on important academic skills. Do you think the changes will be beneficial?

The College Board has stated that the SAT needs to become more tailored to what students are actually learning in high school rather than studying for the test itself. In order to accomplish this, several changes will be put into effect for the 2016 SAT:

• The upper-level vocabulary will be changed to words used more frequently in college classes
• The math section will focus primarily on linear equations, functions and proportional thinking
• Less portions of the math section will allow the use of a calculator
• The writing section will be optional and graded separately from the math and reading sections
• The scoring will revert to the old 1600-maximum (a perfect score would be an 800 in math and an 800 in reading)
• The exam will be available on paper or on the computer
• There will no longer be a penalty for incorrectly guessing answers
• The reading section will contain questions that require the student to select a quote from the passage that justifies their answer to a multiple choice question

Overall, the new SAT will be more similar to its main competitor, the ACT. While these changes will not be completely in effect until the spring of 2016, students, teachers and parents will likely begin preparing for them now. But we want to know your thoughts.