The College Board, a non-profit organization that offersone of the two standardized tests in the United States for colleges, is taking a lot of heat from test takers who took the 2018 June and August SAT.

On June 2, students took the exam at various test sites and many came out thinking that they did well. When the scores rolled out, however, many saw their scores lower than previous tests, despite having significantly less incorrect answers.

Angry students and parents sent out strongly worded emails to the College Board, expressing concerns and requesting a rescore of the test. The concerns expressed did not prevail, however.

On Twitter, the College Board tweeted, “We understand your questions about your June SAT scores. We want to assure you that your scores are accurate. While we plan for consistency across administrations, on occasion there are some tests that can be easier or more difficult than usual.

That is why we use a statistical process called ‘equating.’ Equating makes sure that a score for a test taken on one date is equivalent to a score from another date. So, for example, a single incorrect answer on one administration could equal two or three incorrect answers on a more difficult version. The equating process ensures fairness for all students.”

Chris Yung ’19, one of the test takers of the June SAT, understands why the harsh curve was given out for the test, but does not think College Board should have given this test.

“I think the curve was fair, because the test was pretty easy. However, I think that College Board should not have given such an easy test that would warrantsuch a harsh curve. I got five wrong in math and that was -110 points, which is crazy.”

The criticism the College Board received eventually died out, with students accepting that nothing will be done and choosing to focus on the next SAT instead.

The fury of the students came back, however, after August test takers realized that the exam they took was the same test used for the 2017 October International SAT, which was leaked all over the internet. This created an unfair advantage to those that studied off the leaked test.

A daughter and father inFlorida decided to file a lawsuit against the College Board for compensation, because they claim the organization failed to maintain the integrity of the test.

Sean Moore ’19 disagrees. He said, “Though students may have known about the reused test, they are few in comparison to all the test takers. The scores would therefore be unaffected by those who had the unfair advantage, and the ones who did see a suspicious increase in their scores would have scores delayed or cancelled anyways.”

Those who are unsatisfied withthe SAT have an alternative: the ACT. This test has not had any recent problems and might increase the security of their tests by making students take it on a computer, which is being tested in various international tests.

According to Melissa Nagar, Head of College Counseling, “Colleges are very much aware of the impact of the unfair advantage in the differences in scoring. The admissions, in recent months, understand that there were some issues with the exam.”

She continued, “While thenumbers might definitely impactstudents individually, I think colleges are aware that these things exist in the system, so they’re always going to take these test scores with a grain of salt.”