Case Closed? Seems So: No “Superscoring” of Current and New SAT Scores.

Remember the push to adopt the metric measurement system? The rest of the world came knocking at our country’s door – that world where most everyone used meters and kilograms instead of feet and pounds. Maybe you don’t remember, because nothing of substance happened. Beyond high school science and math class use of metric terms, all the hoopla has been virtually forgotten. Well, suppose you were asked to use both kilometers and miles every day on your way to and from your daily rounds at school or work. Chances are there would be errors, and you would, of course, wonder why the two were being used in the first place.

This is not far from the situation facing colleges who will for a period of time receive scores from the final SAT tests of the current variety (last test in the current form is January 23), and scores from the redesigned SAT which will be administered for the first time in March of this year. The scoring systems are completely different! To compare the results of one to those of the other would be a Houdini-like magic trick, and colleges are not up to it.

Superscoring, as you may recall, has occurred when a college looks at the Reading, Writing, and Math scores from more than one SAT test that a student has taken, and chooses the best score result from each of those three test sections. Not all schools have superscored. In fact, some highest-tier universities have required students to send in every test score and have not allowed students to make use of the College Board’s Score Choice feature. Score Choice has allowed a student to select which testing result(s) to send to a school as part of the application process.

Why not combine old and new scores? To anyone who has taken a close look at the new SAT test samples released by the College Board, the answer is obvious: apples and oranges. The soon-to-be-retired, current SAT and the redesigned test beginning in March 2016 are vastly different. The new scoring system itself is remarkably changed –a total of fifteen scores will be reported from a single test administration! Compare that to the four on the current SAT.

Exam content has been significantly altered, too. The new analytical SAT essay, some say, is from another planet, the math test content far more difficult, and the reading far more demanding. Whether or not you agree, it’s clear that the tests are different enough so that colleges and universities will not superscore test scores from “old” and “new.” In fact, they won’t even try.

Score at the Top