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For many college-bound students, taking the SAT is a pivotal part of the college admissions process. For some students in certain states, the SAT also plays a considerable role in their high school careers, as it has replaced other standardized tests used to measure aptitude and student achievement.
Replacing other state-administered standardized tests with the SAT is a rather new phenomenon; it was only in 2010 that the College Board (the group that administers the SAT) introduced a program called SAT School Day , which was designed to increase access to the exam by offering it on a weekday in school. However, it wasn’t until the redesign of the SAT to make it align with common core standards in 2015-2016 that the SAT gained momentum for use in high schools.
There are a variety of reasons why some states have opted to use the SAT in lieu of other standardized tests, such as:
In 2019-20, 11 states used SAT School Day to measure student achievement under the Every Student Succeeds Act .
In addition to some of the obvious benefits of states requiring the SAT, there are a handful of other under-the-radar advantages.
The most notable benefit of taking a state-required SAT is that the state pays for the exam—and the four free score reports that come with it. This reduces the financial burden on students and their families, provides the exam to students who might not be able to afford it, and makes retaking the exam more economically palatable. According to research from the College Board , 63% of students increase their SAT test score when taking the exam more than once.
High schoolers building attention-grabbing college profiles have busy schedules—studying for high-level courses, participating in extracurricular activities, working after-school jobs, and maintaining a social life are all time consuming. State-required SATs allow a student to take the exam on school time and frees up a weekend day.
Sitting for a state-required SAT allows students to polish their standardized test-taking skills on the state’s dime. Whether you’re planning on taking the SAT a second time or the ACT, taking any standardized test provides valuable firsthand experience.
Students using the School Day SAT as preparation for taking the exam a second time can also stack the dates relatively close together, so that the experience is fresh in their mind when retaking the test. For example, the late March and April SAT School Day dates are excellent preparation for the May SAT.
Keep in mind, however, that you should take this in-school SAT as seriously as any other, as it will be part of your official testing record, and counts towards your total number of SATs taken.
Many students debate whether they should take the SAT or the ACT —most students are better-suited to one exam than the other. Getting to take the SAT for free allows a student to make an educated decision on whether the SAT or ACT is the ideal exam for them.
When you take the SAT has no effect on your score. A student’s SAT score is solely based on how they perform on the exam and is not impacted by the performance of other students. In fact, the SAT doesn’t score on a “curve” at all, rather, they use a process known as “equating.”
Equating is a statistical process used to ensure standardized exam scores are fair for all test takers. Equating does not consider factors such as when you took the SAT or how other students performed on the SAT; what it does figure for is the difficulty of the version of the SAT taken compared to other versions of the SAT. This is to ensure no student is advantaged, or disadvantaged, by taking a particular exam.
Learn more about how the College Board scores the SAT in our article, How Does the Curve Work for the SAT?