College Board SAT results
August 30, 2006
Bridgewater
Raynham
Easton
East Bridgewater
West Bridgewater
Massachusetts
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Massachusetts
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Opinion/Analysis
Joseph Gillis Jr.
You can do something!
While there has been a great deal of discussion about the lower SAT test results in Massachusetts and across the country, other tables in the full report (www.collegeboard.com/about/news_info/cbsenior/yr2006/reports.html)
and the specific Massachusetts data (www.collegeboard.com/prod_downloads/about/news_info/cbsenior/yr2006/massachusetts-2006.pdf)
tell some interesting stories.
Of the 60 thousand Massachusetts students who participated, roughly 3/4 specified one or more institutions to have their scores sent to, for a total of over two thousand different schools. At the top of the list was UMass-Amherst where one-third of responding 'score senders' forwarded results. In positions 2 to 5 were Northeastern, Boston University, Boston College and UMass Dartmouth. In number 6, with about one in eight students was Bridgewater State College.
The administration of our own local College should be proud that their school is thought of so well by students across the State. {Table 28 in the MA data provided that information.}
Table 27 breaks out the Mean Scores for intended College Majors. There are some interesting observations that can be made from those statistics. As a reminder, SAT scores span from 200 to 800 in three areas - critical reading, mathematics, writing. Two-thirds of the test is now english language arts. The Table 27 shows Mean Scores for majors, so I simply added the three numbers together to determine a total. While only 3 % of test takers specified "Language and Literature' as the major, it combined score was 1767 at the top of the list (in my very unscientific add). But, this makes sense given that 2/3 of the test is english. #2 was "Foreign Languages", but #3 was "Mathematics". With the heavy weighting now on english language testing, the rank for "Mathematics" did surprise me.
One other surprise area was "Education". Representing 7% of test takers, my unscientific addition of three Mean Scores added to 1459, placing it 19 out of 23. "Business and Commerce", representing 17% of test takers only fared slightly better with a combined 1495.
Intriguiging... scores on standardized tests and stated intended college majors.
