Dealing With Bias In The SAT

Standardized testing (SATs), in the United States has been present for years and has caused plenty of teachers, students, parents, and other individuals who are informed about it to have different perspectives and opinions on it. Before doing my research on the different opinions people had on standardized tests, I always believed they were encouraged by professors and school facilities. As a student myself and on the behalf of other students, standardized tests were always perceived to be stressful and unjust. Test taking was never a strength of mine especially if the test was timed because it just added more pressure to answer the questions quick. In high school, my teachers never discussed how they felt towards the SATs, which made

On a blog post called “Dealing with Bias in the SAT” which supports the idea or discovery, a student named Olivia commented, “I am Latina and I think that racial bias in SAT tests is utter nonsense.” (Teaching Tolerance 2010), and posted a link that discussed what the author believed the issue really is. A report conducted by the University of California professor, Mark Wilson concludes, through careful examination and comparison of different tests, that African American students did not do as well as white students because minorities in general have a hard time understanding certain words on the test (Junkscience Mom 2010). Reading this contradictory article raised confusion to me on what the real truth behind the biased claims are. As the student Olivia stated, she thinks that the questions are not biased against any race, which is the other students who stated their opinions on the same websites and her perspective on the idea. As Wilson, stated he also agrees that the reason why minorities do not score as high as is due to their lack of knowledge on certain words since most of them are raised in low-budget areas and go to schools that lack some of the resources needed for aid on the SATs. A minority herself and a college professor agree that there is not any bias questions on the SATs and they just do not

courses in college that have opened up my mind to the issue. The more information I learn about this issue, the more surprised I am that our society still exhibits bias, because as much as the United States preaches about equality, it appears as if society has segregation in minor ways. Although the debate between whether there are biased questions on the SATs or not seems to favor that there aren’t by popular opinions, there is still biased behavior occurring in school systems that prevent certain groups of students from getting the proper resources needed. Because I would like to work in an low-income area, which most likely would contain minorities, as a teacher I would make the effort to help those students get the sufficient help needed. This motivates me to become a part of the education field, because caring teachers are much needed in area like this. Teaching is a privilege because it is an opportunity to provide students with a blessing of knowledge that they may not be able to obtain from home. Minorities from low-income areas most likely do not live in the best conditions, therefore they need to utilize the classroom as a safe haven. Knowing that these student probably cannot afford to get a tutor for the SATs or even study properly because they do not understand the context, makes me want to be a teacher who would offer tutoring sessions for free, find