My own observation is that handhelds drop IQ by at least 10 points.
Three words sure to be removed - respect, corpsman, Syracuse.
What some people call “under promise and over deliver,” we call “improved performance through lowered expectations.”
So they're gonna use "f*ck" as a substitute?
Back in the old days the SAT score corresponded with intelligence.
May B they should just write the test like they talk.U kno it would B EZ to pass that way. B 4 it was 2 hard.
The hard vocabulary, particularly in the form of analogies, was taken out a couple of decades ago.
The current SAT is a cinch for anyone who thinks logically and speaks English.
Making English easier for the urban youths:
Toys R us
Urban translate:
We be toys
“Another change will include granting students credit for guessing. Currently, points are deducted for incorrect answers.”
THIS IS THE BIG CHANGE.
On the old exam, if there were 5 possible answers, you got one point for the correct one and a minus 1/4 for a wrong one. Pure guessing would get you a net of zero on average.
More importantly, if you got fooled, and you think you nailed it, you definitely lost 1/4 point.
Bottomline: On the old test, getting fooled was worse than random guessing.
On the new test, getting fooled is not all that bad.
For example, get all 100 question right vs. getting them all wrong. The old system means the losers get beat 100 to minus 25. The new system means the losers get beat 100 to 0.
It's no surprise that selective colleges now require at least half a dozen AP classes with 4 or 5 on the test even to be considered for admission.
How long before AP courses are considered part of "white privilege?" and "equalized?"
Anybody for junking the SATs and using school performance instead?
Hard words? Hard like “sesquipedalianism” or hard like “adamantine?”
No one seems to be mentioning it here or elsewhere, but the SATs have been dumbed down consistently (once in every 4-5 years) since the mid-60s. Tired of the “dumbed-down” accusation, the test-makers in the early late 80s tried a little PR. The tests weren’t being dumbed-down, but “re-centered.” The re-centering never stopped. And whaddyaknow—Fairfax County finally had two 1600-ers in the same year (think it was ‘93). We were never told how many more 1500+ scores resulted; but overall “achievement” definitely improved. Coincidence, no doubt.
Worse still, tho, is the predictor-of-college-success ruse. I can’t imagine that there’s a soul (ANY soul who seriously wants a degree) in the country who can’t get a degree in something. Of course, there are few takers in the math/engineering/sciences areas—even where scholarships abound. But who needs all that brain-exercise when there are oh-so-many other paths to sheepskin?
Yes, it would be right, in some circumstances, to say that the SATs (even the ACTs) are extraneous and obsolete. But if they’re eliminated, what’s left is the dumbed-down, re-centered, wholly subjective and local classroom grade.
Czarina of linguistics Rachel Jentael has been tapped to re-qrite the new improved SAT vocabulary test. Guaranteed 100% free of cursive.
Nigguh is to Crackuh as Skittle is to Drank