Washington, D.C.—The College Board announced SAT® scores today for the class of 2006, the first to take the new version of the SAT featuring a writing section.
"We're pleased that we now have a cohort of students who have taken the new writing section of the test. The addition of writing has made the SAT a better measure of the skills students need to succeed in college and later in life. We will continue to work with schools and colleges to encourage high standards and a greater focus on writing in the classroom," said Gaston Caperton, president of the College Board.
Females outscored males on the writing section, which consists of a multiple-choice portion and an essay. The average writing score for all was 497. Females scored an average of 502, 11 points higher than males, who scored an average of 491. A stronger female performance in writing was evident across every racial/ethnic group.
For the class of 2006, overall combined scores for mathematics and critical reading dropped by seven points from last year, which represents less than 1 percentage point.
- Mathematics scores dipped by 2 points to 518, returning to the level of two years ago. Both male and female mathematics scores declined by 2 points to 536 and 502, respectively.
- Average critical reading scores decreased 5 points to 503. The critical reading score decline was more pronounced among males. Male scores declined by 8 points to 505; female scores by 3 points to 502.
- The 2-point drop in the average mathematics score represents approximately one-fifth of one test question on the SAT; the 5-point drop in the average critical reading score represents approximately one-half of one test question.
Score Decline Factors
"When a new test is introduced, students usually vary their test-taking behavior in a variety of ways and this affects scores," Caperton said.
The most significant factor in the overall decline is mainly attributable to a change in student test-taking patterns, according to the College Board. The most notable change in test-taking behavior involved a decrease in retesting. Typically, students who take the test a second time see a 30-point increase on their combined score. Much of the score difference this year can be attributed to this decline in the number of students retaking the test and gaining the advantage of a score increase.
Research has shown that fatigue is not a factor. A College Board analysis of the performance of more than 700,000 test-takers on the critical reading and mathematics sections during the spring and fall 2005 SAT administrations showed no difference in student performance. There was no difference in either number of items correct or number of items omitted, between sections that appeared early in the test and sections that appeared later in the test.
Subgroup Differences in Mathematics, Critical Reading, and Writing
ESL: Students for whom English is a second language increased 5 points in critical reading to 467 and 2 points in mathematics to 523. They scored 469 on the writing section. Although this is 28 points below the mean for all students, it is a smaller gap than these students experienced for critical reading. More ESL students took the SAT this year.
Race/Ethnicity: African American and Mexican American critical reading scores, 434 and 454 respectively, improved over last year by one point each. American Indian mathematics scores improved by 1 point to 494 and Mexican American mathematics scores improved over last year by 2 points to 465. The largest declines in critical reading were seen among White and Other Hispanic students, both down by 5 points to 527 and 458, respectively.
Male/Female: Males experienced a greater score decline than females in critical reading across all ethnic groups. In addition, males outscored females in critical reading in all ethnic groups except for African American in which females scored 7 points higher than males. Furthermore, males outscored females across all ethnic groups in mathematics. Conversely, females outperformed males in writing across all ethnic groups.
"It is heartening to see that ESL students and their teachers increased student scores in critical reading and math and focused a lot of energy on the new SAT writing section," Caperton said. "We're pleased to see that the subgroup gaps, while still significant, are narrowing. Clearly for all of our students, though, American education must do a better job of developing literacy skills so that students achieve their full potential in an increasingly global world."
Student Performance on Essay
The essay asked students to respond to a point of view on an issue through an original first-draft format and support a position with reasoning and examples taken from reading, studies, experience, or observations. Two readers scored each essay, each reader providing a score from 1 to 6 for a maximum score of 12. The average essay score was 7.2 out of 12. Reader agreement on essay scores was very high. Nearly 97 percent of readers exactly agreed on scores or differed by only one point. Only 3 percent of essays needed to be resolved by a third reader. The College Board performed analyses on 6,498 essays randomly sampled from the March 2005 through January 2006 SAT administrations. Results demonstrated that longer essays were more likely to receive higher scores; however, the relationship between length and score was only moderate (.62). Eighty-four percent of essay responses reached the second page. Half the essays used the first-person voice. Score differences were slight, with first-person-voice essays averaging a score of 6.9, compared to 7.2 for those not using first-person voice. Only 8 percent of essays were identified as using the typical five-paragraph essay structure. Fifty-three percent of essays used academic examples (historical, literary/art/music, science or technology, and current events or politics) and 52 percent of essays included some type of personal experience as supporting evidence. Some students used both types of examples.
"It was really a pleasure to read through samples of student essays because they were so varied and personal," Caperton said. "They provided an inspiring glimpse into how these young people solve problems and use writing to express their ideas."
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