I understandand agree with the rationale behind the newly redesigned SAT. It’s looking to be fair and relevant.
To that end, it aims for more real-world applications and analysis–not knowledge in the abstract. And so long to those relatively obscure vocabulary words that never get used–even by the most, well, punctilious of students.
Another change: the essay. It was introduced in 2005–the year analogy questions were dropped–and now will become optional. Recall that a major part of the rationale for the essay’s inclusion was to assess thought organization, logic and coherence.
Alas, those skills are not optional at the next level.