Schools Address Lower SAT Scores
Some Say New Test Simply Sets New Bar

By William Wan
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, September 10, 2006

When results from the 2006 SAT were released last month, they landed with something of a thud in Charles County.

There, students' scores on the college entrance exam dropped 30 points in reading and 29 points in math on the newly revised test. Although scores declined generally in this first administration of the new SAT, Charles recorded the largest drop of any school system in the Washington region, according to the College Board, which develops and oversees the test.

One Charles County Board of Education member decried the results as evidence of a serious problem within the school system, but administrators in Charles did not acknowledge the decline, saying the new scores are from a revamped test so different from the old exam that scores on the two cannot be fairly compared.

"It's like comparing apples and oranges," Deputy Superintendent Ronald G. Cunningham said of the latest SAT, which includes modified math and reading (formerly verbal) sections and a new writing section.

School officials in Charles were not the only holdouts on SAT comparisons. Montgomery County public school administrators, who saw a much smaller decline in scores -- by two points in both math and reading -- similarly refused to compare the new SAT scores with those from prior years.

"We're establishing this year as a new baseline because of the new SAT," said Montgomery schools spokesman Brian Edwards. "Future years will be compared against this year's."

SAT officials, however, dismissed such explanations. "We worked very hard to make sure those scores were comparable," said Brian O'Reilly, executive director of SAT information services. "It was essential so colleges could compare students applying using the old test and those with the new.

"Yes, scores fluctuate from year to year," O'Reilly added, "but if a school district's looking at an increase or decrease of more than 20 points, they should be trying to figure out if there's some explanation other than the kids just didn't do as well this time around."

Across the nation, average scores dropped by five points in reading, the biggest decline in 31 years, and by two points in math. The slight nationwide decline, SAT officials believe, was caused not by changes in format but in student behavior: Fewer students took the test more than once to improve their scores, and some took it earlier as juniors to avoid the new version.

In Virginia, the District and Maryland, the average combined scores for math and reading dropped by 14 or less points. The combined drop in Charles was 59 points. One of the county's schools, Lackey High School, posted an overall decline of 90 points.

"It should be cause for concern," said school board member Margaret Young, who has criticized the county's approach to the SAT in the past. She pointed to the small portion of Charles seniors taking the test, 34 percent of last year's class compared with 70 percent of seniors statewide.

"With so few seniors taking the test, it's like culling the herd," she said. "Our scores should be way, way higher than the rest of the state's."

Charles school officials, she said, have discouraged students from taking the test, or at least have failed to encourage them to do so.

But Charles officials, who noted that their scores are still above the state and national averages, stressed that they do not dissuade students from the SAT and pointed to several test preparation programs in their schools.

"Our job is to make the students' dreams come true, whatever direction they want," said La Plata High School Principal Garth Bowling. "If they don't need to take this test, we don't push them into it against their will."

In recent decades, college as an option has become more prevalent in Charles, as the county, once known for its stretches of tobacco farms, surged with new residents, development and businesses. The favorite destination for the county's high school graduates remains the College of Southern Maryland, a community college that does not require SAT scores from applicants.

"There are some in the field who think the SAT is the only way to college, but we know, having worked with many colleges, that there are other paths," said Judy Estep, Charles public schools' assistant superintendent of instruction. "Students can take the ACT, too, and besides, a large number of our students choose to go to CSM, which has their own entrance exam."

A small but growing number of small liberal arts colleges have begun making SAT scores optional for admission. And critics have called the test an overly simplistic predictor of students' college potential and possibly unfair to poorer students.

Last month's SAT statistics also showed slightly fewer seniors taking the test, 9,800 fewer nationally, than the previous year. Meanwhile, the Iowa City-based ACT -- more popular in the Midwest -- gained about 20,000 with the Class of 2006. For most colleges, scores from either the SAT or the ACT are still required.

"If you're a student in Charles and even thinking of going to college, why not take the SAT?" said school board member Young. "It can't hurt. It opens the door to scholarships and gives you college options."

In neighboring Calvert County, where the rate of seniors taking the SAT has hovered slightly higher in recent years at about 55 percent, officials said they would like to increase that figure, but they also pointed out new pressures school systems face in today's test-saturated environment.

"We had a slight dip in SAT scores and the number of students participating, so of course we're going to reexamine what we're doing," said Ted Haynie, director of system performance. "But the name of the game is HSA" -- Maryland's High School Assessment tests.

In three years, Maryland will begin requiring seniors to pass the assessment tests in order to graduate.

"That's where most of the focus is for high schools in Maryland," Haynie said. "Right now we're talking about 50-some percent taking the SAT. We want that to increase and scores to go up, but we need 100 percent of the kids to graduate."

Staff writer Lori Aratani contributed to this report.