BY MARINA DUNDJERSKI
UCLA Today Staff

The trustees of the College Board, the makers of the SAT, have agreed to revamp the admissions test — a year-and-a-half after University of California President Richard C. Atkinson ignited a firestorm of controversy on the issue of standardized testing by calling for the UC to drop the test as a condition of admission.

The changes to the test, approved by the College Board June 27, include replacing the controversial word analogy section with short reading passages and adding a written essay portion as well as higher-level math concepts found in Algebra II.

“It marks a major event in the history of standardized testing,” Atkinson said. “We need standardized tests that bear a demonstrable relationship to what students actually study in the high school college-preparatory curriculum.”

With more than 90,000 applicants systemwide, the UC — which adopted the SAT in 1968 as a requirement for admission — is the test’s biggest user.

Vu Tran, UCLA’s director of Undergraduate Admissions and Relations with Schools, said that for now the admission process at UCLA would continue as it normally does, with the SAT I being just one of many factors used in admitting a student.

“From a processing point of view, there’s not much change,” Tran said. “But from a fairness point of view, it is a welcome change that will put more emphasis on measuring student achievement.

“The message for us to send to students now is to make sure they take advantage of the classes offered in high school and to study hard,” Tran continued. “If they do that, they will do well on the test. Nothing replaces consistent hard work.”

Students will begin taking the revised SAT I in March 2005.