Project Diary

A Mid-life Crisis of Sorts: Why I Love the SATs

I was not a great student in high school.  I did well enough so that everyone left me alone, but I was much more interested in being social than with academics in studying.*

Martha McPhee and Debbie Stier circa 1982This is picture of me with my dear friend Martha McPhee right around the time I first took the SATs in 1982.

I did so horribly on the SATs back then, that my options were narrowed to colleges that didn't require the scores (i.e. Bennington, Bard, Sarah Lawrence, and Hampshire).

Lest you think I exaggerate, I am going to be brave enough to post my 1982 scores, which I managed to track down thanks to the College Board.

But first, one very important qualifier:

SAT scores were re-centered in 1995 because the center had fallen (i.e. 500 was now an above-average score).  It's like going to the Gap and finding out that you suddenly fit into a size 2 when you were a size 6 last time you checked.  It sure feels good, but the fact of the matter is that you didn't lose any weight they just made the sizes bigger.  Same thing with the SATs.  As far as I can tell, no one seems to be aware of the fallen SAT average, except for my good friend and SAT mentor, Catherine Johnson.  Catherine's a treasure trove of SAT information.

So my pitiful SAT scores from 1982 would actually appear slightly better if I took them today.  In fact, the 480 I scored in 1982 on the math section would have been a 510 in 2011 -- which happens to be the exact same math score I got when I took the SATs for the first time in nearly 30 years in January, 2011.

The good news is that I managed to have a pretty successful life, despite my appalling SAT scores.

The bad news is that I regret having squandered my high school education.

2011 is the year when I'm going to try to make up for lost time. You can read more about the Perfect Score Project on the About page of this site, follow along on this blog (I'll attempt to post daily), check out the video updates, etc. I hope some useful information will come out of this journey.

And please, send your SAT advice my way.  Clearly, I can use all the help I can get.

* I made a classic SAT Writing Passage mistake here:  "faulty parallelism."

 
13 Comments | posted April 5th, 2011
 
 
  • Anonymous

    I had no idea about the falling standard. Doesn't that also mean students today are becoming less and less capable, at least from a SAT score point of view?

    • http://www.perfectscoreproject.com Debbie Stier

      yes, that's exactly what that means.

      depressing, right?

  • Maryl

    I am a first-time visitor (linked from The Happiness Project): you blow my mind! First, my daughter graduated from high school in 2009 and I am STILL recovering from the vicarious agony of SAT's and AP exams! Second, I am a 50-something physician and I cannot imagine taking a math exam (a graphing calculator? What would I do with that?). I just took my Emergency Medicine re-certifcation exam (10 years since the last one) and studied all summer; painful enough. Third, your posts are hilarious and charming. Great work!

    • http://www.perfectscoreproject.com Debbie Stier

      Thank you! You made my day!
      Inexplicably, I find SAT work fun. I'm struggling with internet addiction at the moment though and have decided that as a result, "online courses" probably aren't the best for me. So I'm logging off for a few hours to hit the books (the paper kind).

  • Pingback: FAQs | Perfect Score Project

  • Pingback: Grockit Is Up Next Month | Perfect Score Project

  • http://profiles.google.com/ladygreen Catherine Taylor

    Read hard (usually much older) books ravenously. Vocabulary lists only help with words that actually show up on your SAT exam, while if you read books with advanced grammar, you will start to understand and recognize correct usage of a multitude of new words.

    • http://www.perfectscoreproject.com Debbie Stier

      Ok! Done! Do you have suggestions? The Odyssey? Shakespeare? The Bible?

      • http://profiles.google.com/ladygreen Catherine Taylor

        Those are all certainly good to read, but involve a fair amount of drudgery. For more comfortably language expansion, may I recommend one of my favorite old romances, Under the Rose? It's free online at http://www.gutenberg.org/files/23675/23675-h/23675-h.htm and is a great read. There are also some great novels on Project Gutenberg by authors such as Jane Austen, Baroness Orczy (she wrote the Scarlet Pimpernel and many other books), the Bronte sisters, and many forgotten novelists who used a much higher-level vocabulary than one typically sees in modern books.

        • http://www.perfectscoreproject.com Debbie Stier

          All great suggestions. Thank you.

          Going to order now.....

  • Pingback: Report From the SAT Trenches | Perfect Score Project

  • Pingback: The Best Evidence Is Frequently Ignored | Perfect Score Project

  • Pingback: Take 2: About the Perfect Score Project | Perfect Score Project

 

TAGS:
, , , ,