Why are students calling new all-digital SAT exam 'worst one yet'?

The College Board claims to have made changes to SAT's design to reduce stress among students

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A representation image showing students preparing for SAT exams. — X/@CollegeSpring
A representation image showing students preparing for SAT exams. — X/@CollegeSpring

The United States on Saturday conducted the Scholastic Assessment Test (SAT) entirely digtally for the first time ever and students are not so impressed.

According to a student from Brooklyn, New York, who already took two tests with pencil and paper, Saturday’s college admissions exam was "the worst one yet".

Additionally, the all-digital test is designed to be "adaptive", which means that the difficulty of questions will change depending on how students performed in prior sections, the New York Post reported.

"I suspect it was much tougher for kids who do well on it because it is now an adaptive exam," said Ben Morden, a Manhattan representative to the Citywide Council on High Schools.

The College Board has defended its decision to skip difficult questions, despite criticisms of a "dumbing down" of the 98-year-old test, stating that easier questions won't disadvantage students. 

Many students found the maths section to be the most challenging while another student deemed the reading and writing sections as "insane".

"I practised all the Bluebook tests and SAT Suite questions, but the real ones were more difficult," she wrote in a Facebook page for digital test prep. 

"I [didn't] have enough time to check my answers and read all the questions."

The students are now given two hours and 14 minutes for the test, replacing the previous three hours. Additionally, students can now expect their results in days instead of weeks.

The College Board claims to have made the changes to the test's design to reduce stress among students.