Why Is the SAT Back (Again)?
What A Day
What A Day
4.6 • 12.6K Ratings
🗓️ 8 June 2024
⏱️ 31 minutes
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Summary
Until recently, many people—and colleges—rejected the SAT as a racist and classist metric that perpetuated social divides. But now it’s being championed as a tool for closing some of those same gaps! This week on How We Got Here: why does public opinion on the SAT keep flip-flopping? Who does the test privilege? And is it really the best metric we’ve got for college admissions? With Erin on maternity leave, “What A Day” all-star Priyanka Aribindi joins Max to assess the racist roots of the SAT, how it’s evolved since, and how its history reflects attitudes towards access to higher education.
SOURCES:
Major Changes Adopted in SAT College Exam - Los Angeles Times
The Misguided War on the SAT - The New York Times
Colleges Dropped the SAT and ACT. Here’s Why Many High Schools Didn’t. - WSJ
The SATs are: a) dying; b) already dead; c) alive and well; d) here forever - Vox
Interviews - Henry Chauncey | Secrets Of The Sat | FRONTLINE | PBS
Why US Colleges Are Reviving Standardized Tests - Bloomberg
Standardized Test Scores and Academic Performance at Ivy-Plus Colleges
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | So Prianka, I'm confused about something that I see young people doing a lot lately. |
| 0:04.1 | Look, I am not working late because I'm a singer, but I get why they all can't stop saying it. |
| 0:08.8 | No, I don't mean singing along to Sabrina Carpenter. |
| 0:12.4 | I mean, everyone to Sabrina Carpenter. I mean everyone is taking the |
| 0:13.8 | SAT. Well I mean that makes sense for a lot of us that was a requirement to get |
| 0:18.0 | into college. But that's my point like I thought we all decided in 2020 that |
| 0:21.9 | we were moving away from the SAT in college admissions. |
| 0:24.5 | A bunch of schools dropped it as a requirement, but now it's back. |
| 0:27.4 | Yale University tonight is the latest school reversing course, now requiring standardized test scores for college admissions |
| 0:34.2 | after hundreds of schools shifted to test optional in recent years. |
| 0:38.2 | That was NBC News a few months ago and now here we are in what will probably be a record-breaking year in SAT test taking. |
| 0:44.5 | It's in, it's out, it's in again, very 90s of the SAT. |
| 0:48.2 | I'm Max Fisher. |
| 0:51.7 | And I'm Priyanka Aribindi filling in for Aaron Ryan. |
| 0:54.3 | Aaron is on maternity leave, we'll be back in a couple of months. |
| 0:57.1 | And this is how we got here, a series where we explore a big question behind the week's |
| 1:01.5 | headlines and tell a story that answers that question. |
| 1:04.3 | This week we're talking about the return of the SAT. |
| 1:08.1 | It's a story that is about so much more than just this little test. |
| 1:11.6 | Big test, Max. |
| 1:12.7 | I don't know if you remember taking it back in the day. |
| 1:14.9 | I think I've tried to block out |
... |
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