Almost all Mayfield juniors took the SAT on April 9 during the school day.  These standardized tests have caused many students to experience increased test anxiety.

The SAT and ACT are entrance exams that most colleges and universities examine to determine admission and college acceptance. The tests are multiple choice, pencil-and-paper formatted, and administered by the College Board.

According to Jeffrey Legan, principal at Mayfield High School, the SAT/ACT does not always give an overview of a students education and learning. He said, “I don’t believe that it’s necessary, but as of right now, for many colleges it is necessary for them to have these tests. However, a test score does not always paint a picture of who the person is as a student or just as a person in general.”

Jarrod Muhleman, the assistant principal for curriculum, instruction, and staff development, agrees that the SAT/ACT are not the best way to evaluate a students’ overall knowledge.

He said, “There is a whole host of reasons why they [the College Board] use SAT/ACT, however, I don’t think it is always in the best interest of students, which is unfortunate. I think kids put a lot of pressure on themselves to do well because they want to get in to the top schools or want to receive certain financial aid or scholarship money, and I wish there was a better way because I don’t think it is always the best predictor for student success and knowledge.”

Junior Emily Byrne believes that finals or regular tests would be a better way to showcase a student’s overall knowledge. She said, “I think that the standardized tests are pointless because it doesn’t determine your intelligence or how well you perform in school. I think that regular tests or finals are a much better example of your intelligence because it’s stuff that you actually know you learned this year, and it shows how well you perform in school at the current time.”

Mulheman explained that being timed on standardized tests can be one of the many reasons as to why some students don’t always perform well. He said, “I don’t think that being timed is a good predictor and measure of how well kids are going to do in college, and that can be another component of the stress explaining why some students don’t do well.”

According to Byrne, it can be difficult to perform well on tests when she is being timed. She said, “I don’t do well under timers, and I think we should get the amount it takes us to finish the test because one minute for one math problem is not realistic since you need time to set it all up and then solve it which I believe can take up to three minutes depending on the problem.”

There are different kinds of students and learners, one of them being kids who work really hard to get good grades but are not always the best test takers. Legan said,  “Kids work hard to get into certain colleges, and no matter what college you get into you’re going to do well. It’s sad that our society has put so much pressure on having a perfect high school transcript in order to make anything of yourself, which is so far from the truth.”

English teacher Alexandra Shaw believes the SAT/ACT’s can be stressful because students aren’t able to study the exact material that is going to be on the tests. She said, “Some colleges put such a high stake on it where kids feel like it’s the only way they will get into college which can be stressful at a young age. It is also hard because you don’t always know what is going to be on the test, you can guess and practice but a lot of it is a surprise to you.”

In an attempt to help, teachers try to prepare students for the standardized tests as best they can, but there is still stress that comes with preparation.

According to Legan, teachers feel a little pressure to make sure that their kids are prepared because we don’t want to fail them, but when students leave high school, I would rather see what their endeavors are and know that they are following their passion.

Since there is a lot of emphasis on these standardized tests, schools have started preparing kids as early as 8th grade.

Mulheman said, “I think now more than ever there is better access to SAT preparation with CollegeBoard partnering with Khan Academy. The state is allowed choose between SAT and ACT for the one free exam that our eleventh graders would take, We decided on the SAT because of Khan Academy and the access our kids could have to test prep materials and because of that we now offer the PSAT in 8th, 9th, and 10th grade. So we have all those years worth of experience with that test to try to disarm it and make it a little less stressful encounter.”

Universities and colleges are starting to develop new ways to apply besides the standardized tests.

Legan said, “There is a new transcript coming out called the mastery-based transcript, and it’s more of a portfolio to show off a student’s work rather than just a test score. For example, if you’re studying humanities and you want to show off your writing skills opposed to just your ACT/SAT scores you would be showing your actual work you created and worked hard on.”

Although the SAT/ACT can be a lot of stress and pressure at times, just focus on preparing as best you can.

“Work hard in school, and do test prep but don’t lose sleep over this because there is more to life than this standardized test,” said Legan.