College Board Errors Raise Doubts About Meritocracy

The College Board, which administers the SAT Reasoning Test taken every year by millions of college-bound seniors, announced that a new investigation shows a pattern of scoring errors reaching back at least several decades. The findings come on the heels of embarrassing revelations that several hundred SAT answer sheets this year were miscoded, apparently because they were left in damp conditions.

The newest inquiry showed that over the last fifty years perhaps hundreds of thousands of students received scores well above those they actually achieved, the Board said.  Meanwhile, an almost equal number received results that were lower than they should have been. The average difference was 150 points, raising questions about the roles that merit and achievement play in American society.

“For many, 150 points means the difference between attending a great university instead of a community college,” said a spokesman for FairTest, a critic of standardized testing. “It means becoming a banker on Wall Street instead of a barista at Starbucks. It means landing the hot model who sat at one’s table at a fashion show instead of having to settle for Bill’s friend Julie who couldn’t get a date until you agreed at the last minute. Who knows how different we would be as a nation if these errors hadn’t occurred?”

A glimmering of an answer is beginning to emerge from more in-depth research now underway at the College Board.  Among those erroneously receiving higher scores than they deserved, the Board said, are at least 75 percent of the members of state legislatures, a majority of federal judges, and virtually every investment banker ever hired by Fidelity Investments.

“Meanwhile, it turns out that most cab drivers in major metropolitan cities received lower scores than they should have,” said the College Board in a press release. “In all likelihood, this explains why hackies always seem to know so much more than everyone else.”

Some have argued that the errors by the College Board may go to the highest reaches of the US Government, affecting even the President himself.  George W. Bush denied that was the case.  “SAT scores had nothing to do with my admission to Yale,” he told reporters.  “I’m proud to say it was all due to family connections.”