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When I first heard they were shortening the exam by 30%, I thought that was unfortunate, since it would either make the test less reliable or impose a lower cei

When I first heard they were shortening the exam by 30%, I thought that was unfortunate, since it would either make the test less reliable or impose a lower ceiling on the range it can assess. However, I later learned that it will be dynamic — depending on how a student does in the first section on a given topic, he will be given either easier or harder versions of a subsequent section. That means that they'll be able to better assess students of all abilities with fewer total questions. Sounds like a win to me. Of course, dynamic testing like this is not possible with hard copies. Seems like a decent rationale for moving to computerized testing, though I would still be fine if they did it hard copy, for 3 hours.

iraqmtpizza 3y ago
If you can't opt out of the dumb-dumb version regardless of your answers to previous questions then the test is rigged. Not only would it not be directly comparable to previous test years, it would not be comparable to other versions of the test. Defeating the entire point (ranking students)
- glial 3y ago
  Comparability across test years is taken seriously by the folks that make these tests (see e.g. [1,2]). There are valid criticisms to be made, but flippantly calling the test 'rigged' is not constructive. [1] https://www.jstor.org/stable/1435437 https://www.jstor.org/stable/1435437 [2] https://www.ets.org/research/policy_research_reports/publications/report/1995/hxrv.html https://www.ets.org/research/policy_research_reports/publica...
  - iraqmtpizza 3y ago
    I don't care if they claim to take it seriously if they deliberately and thoughtfully make the tests not comparable
glial 3y ago
Shorter is good, but dynamic tests (called "computer adaptive tests" or CAT in the industry) make it difficult to follow longstanding best-practices for test taking. When I took the SAT, I could quickly scan through the questions in the current section and mark those that looked difficult, and save them for the end. With a CAT test, it's typically one-question-at-a-time, and if you're a strong test taker, they get successively more difficult. They are more efficient tests, but (IMHO) less pleasant to take.
- gnicholas 3y ago
  That is true for adaptive tests that operate on a per-question basis. What I have read of the new SAT is that it operates at a session level. So if you do well on the entire first session, you get a harder version of the next session on that topic (reading or math). Students should still be able to use the technique you mention to identify hard questions and save them for last.
  - Kon-Peki 3y ago
    > What I have read of the new SAT is that it operates at a session level. So if you do well on the entire first session, you get a harder version of the next session on that topic (reading or math). That is positive. I've seen issues with adaptive tests not being resilient to accidents and brain farts: if a kid fat-fingers the response to a question early in the test, they may never get the computer to give them questions of a suitable difficulty later in the test. Thus they never even have a chance to get a score that accurately reflects their ability. If the SAT is session-based, each session needs to be large enough that a single question can't tank the whole thing, but at the same time there also needs to be enough sessions to allow for properly dialing-in the knowledge level. In reality, the ideal situation is that the test should allow for an unlimited number of sessions, but each session is time-limited. Something along the lines of stopping once the test-taker gets below a certain score on 2 consecutive sessions.
    - gnicholas 3y ago
      > If the SAT is session-based, each session needs to be large enough that a single question can't tank the whole thing I think each session is either half or a third of the test, for that subject. There could actually be more than two versions of the later session, to ensure that a student who makes a mistake or two isn't prevented from getting a relatively high score.
testfoobar 3y ago
Many kids have an IEP - an individualized education plan. https://www2.ed.gov/parents/needs/speced/iepguide/index.html https://www2.ed.gov/parents/needs/speced/iepguide/index.html They get extra time allocation to take tests - 50% more in most cases. The numbers I hear tossed around is that a substantial fraction (20% to 40%) of school kids in some of the elite public and private schools have IEPs. Clearly there are kids who need the extra time. But that many? ADHD is the reason that I hear the most. The extra test taking time is not reported to colleges. Combine 50% extra time with adderall. 1500+ SAT scores are not uncommon.
- gotoeleven 3y ago
  [flagged]
- jcranmer 3y ago
  > They get extra time allocation to take tests - 50% more in most cases. The numbers I hear tossed around is that a substantial fraction (20% to 40%) of school kids in some of the elite public and private schools have IEPs. Clearly there are kids who need the extra time. But that many? An IEP is a catch-all term for anything that requires special adjustment for a student. What the adjustment is varies depending on the situation--there's a reason it's called individualized. Having gone to one of those "elite public schools", it wouldn't surprise me if that large a fraction of kids had an IEP (hell, I did). However, in my experience, not one kid had an IEP that allotted them extra time to take tests. The only specific test adjustment I'm aware of was one kid who was so blind he needed the exams to be large print to have a hope of reading them.
  - gnicholas 3y ago
    > However, in my experience, not one kid had an IEP that allotted them extra time to take tests. There's a difference between the IEP that the school uses and the accommodation request for standardized testing. It would be pretty obvious to you if a student in your class were given extra time for in-class tests, but much harder for you to know if that student qualified for extra time on the SAT. If you knew when they were taking it then perhaps you could figure it out, but people who bend the rules to get extra time tend to not go around advertising when they're going to take the SAT, or at which test center, since that might out them as receiving extra time. All this to say: I'm not so sure a classmate would know if a fellow student received extra time on the SAT.

iraqmtpizza 3y ago

If you can't opt out of the dumb-dumb version regardless of your answers to previous questions then the test is rigged. Not only would it not be directly comparable to previous test years, it would not be comparable to other versions of the test. Defeating the entire point (ranking students)

glial 3y ago
Comparability across test years is taken seriously by the folks that make these tests (see e.g. [1,2]). There are valid criticisms to be made, but flippantly calling the test 'rigged' is not constructive. [1] https://www.jstor.org/stable/1435437 https://www.jstor.org/stable/1435437 [2] https://www.ets.org/research/policy_research_reports/publications/report/1995/hxrv.html https://www.ets.org/research/policy_research_reports/publica...
- iraqmtpizza 3y ago
  I don't care if they claim to take it seriously if they deliberately and thoughtfully make the tests not comparable

glial 3y ago

Shorter is good, but dynamic tests (called "computer adaptive tests" or CAT in the industry) make it difficult to follow longstanding best-practices for test taking. When I took the SAT, I could quickly scan through the questions in the current section and mark those that looked difficult, and save them for the end. With a CAT test, it's typically one-question-at-a-time, and if you're a strong test taker, they get successively more difficult. They are more efficient tests, but (IMHO) less pleasant to take.

gnicholas 3y ago
That is true for adaptive tests that operate on a per-question basis. What I have read of the new SAT is that it operates at a session level. So if you do well on the entire first session, you get a harder version of the next session on that topic (reading or math). Students should still be able to use the technique you mention to identify hard questions and save them for last.
- Kon-Peki 3y ago
  > What I have read of the new SAT is that it operates at a session level. So if you do well on the entire first session, you get a harder version of the next session on that topic (reading or math). That is positive. I've seen issues with adaptive tests not being resilient to accidents and brain farts: if a kid fat-fingers the response to a question early in the test, they may never get the computer to give them questions of a suitable difficulty later in the test. Thus they never even have a chance to get a score that accurately reflects their ability. If the SAT is session-based, each session needs to be large enough that a single question can't tank the whole thing, but at the same time there also needs to be enough sessions to allow for properly dialing-in the knowledge level. In reality, the ideal situation is that the test should allow for an unlimited number of sessions, but each session is time-limited. Something along the lines of stopping once the test-taker gets below a certain score on 2 consecutive sessions.
  - gnicholas 3y ago
    > If the SAT is session-based, each session needs to be large enough that a single question can't tank the whole thing I think each session is either half or a third of the test, for that subject. There could actually be more than two versions of the later session, to ensure that a student who makes a mistake or two isn't prevented from getting a relatively high score.

testfoobar 3y ago

Many kids have an IEP - an individualized education plan. https://www2.ed.gov/parents/needs/speced/iepguide/index.html https://www2.ed.gov/parents/needs/speced/iepguide/index.html They get extra time allocation to take tests - 50% more in most cases. The numbers I hear tossed around is that a substantial fraction (20% to 40%) of school kids in some of the elite public and private schools have IEPs. Clearly there are kids who need the extra time. But that many? ADHD is the reason that I hear the most. The extra test taking time is not reported to colleges. Combine 50% extra time with adderall. 1500+ SAT scores are not uncommon.

gotoeleven 3y ago
[flagged]
jcranmer 3y ago
> They get extra time allocation to take tests - 50% more in most cases. The numbers I hear tossed around is that a substantial fraction (20% to 40%) of school kids in some of the elite public and private schools have IEPs. Clearly there are kids who need the extra time. But that many? An IEP is a catch-all term for anything that requires special adjustment for a student. What the adjustment is varies depending on the situation--there's a reason it's called individualized. Having gone to one of those "elite public schools", it wouldn't surprise me if that large a fraction of kids had an IEP (hell, I did). However, in my experience, not one kid had an IEP that allotted them extra time to take tests. The only specific test adjustment I'm aware of was one kid who was so blind he needed the exams to be large print to have a hope of reading them.
- gnicholas 3y ago
  > However, in my experience, not one kid had an IEP that allotted them extra time to take tests. There's a difference between the IEP that the school uses and the accommodation request for standardized testing. It would be pretty obvious to you if a student in your class were given extra time for in-class tests, but much harder for you to know if that student qualified for extra time on the SAT. If you knew when they were taking it then perhaps you could figure it out, but people who bend the rules to get extra time tend to not go around advertising when they're going to take the SAT, or at which test center, since that might out them as receiving extra time. All this to say: I'm not so sure a classmate would know if a fellow student received extra time on the SAT.