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WCPSS Students' 2009-10 SAT Scores Top NC and US

September 13, 2010 - Wake County Public School System seniors continue to achieve high scores on the SAT, according to results released today by the College Board. While WCPSS seniors saw their average scores dip slightly, participation rates rose by five percent, and WCPSS students continue to outscore other students around the state and across the nation.

WCPSS compared to state and nation
The WCPSS average score of 1571 is 62 points higher than the US average and 86 points higher than the North Carolina average.

The WCPSS participation remained high with 69 percent of graduating seniors taking the exam. That’s up from 64 percent last year. The WCPSS participation remains higher than the North Carolina participation rate of 63 percent and the U.S. participation rate of 47 percent. The College Board reports 5,782 WCPSS students took the exam.

WCPSS and other North Carolina school systems
WCPSS scores were significantly higher than similar large North Carolina school districts. WCPSS average scores were 72 points higher than Charlotte-Mecklenburg; 96 points higher than Forsyth; 178 points higher than Cumberland and 110 points higher than Guilford.

WCPSS had a participation rate of 69.0 percent. Among other large NC school districts, Charlotte Mecklenburg had a participation rate of 66.3 percent; Guilford had 64.9 percent; Forsyth had 61.3 percent; and Cumberland had 54.2 percent. (The state is reporting that WCPSS had 5,744 test takers and a participation rate of 71.3 percent, which is based on 12th grade enrollment, not graduates.)

Comparing WCPSS scores
SAT scores for 2009-10 WCPSS seniors were 14 points below average WCPSS scores for 2008-09 with decreases of two points in critical reading, five points in math and seven points in writing.

Before the writing portion was added to the SAT five years ago, the exam had two sections, verbal and math. In looking at scores for critical reading (similar to the verbal section) and math, the 2010 average of 1067 is the second highest for WCPSS students over the last five years. While below the 2009 average of 1074, it is above the 2008 average of 1059, 2007 average of 1057 and 2006 average of 1066.

In the last 20 years, the 2005 average of 1075 was the district’s highest average score. Second was the 2009 average of 1074. Third is the 1067 average reached in 2010, 2003 and 2002. The 2010 average of 1067 is sixty points greater than the 1991 average of 1007.

SAT
The SAT is a national exam offered through the College Board. The exam is designed to measure a student's chance of success at the college level.

This is the fifth year of the three-section SAT with math, critical reading and writing. The writing section includes an essay and multiple-choice questions on writing. The critical reading section is different from the old verbal section. The analogies section has been dropped and a new sentence completion section has been added. While the analogies section was eliminated, analogical reasoning was not; questions of this nature are imbedded in the short reading passages. In the math section, Algebra II content was added and quantitative comparisons were eliminated.

The College Board has maintained a scoring system of a total of 800 points per section. On the two sections of the old test, a perfect score would have been 1600. Students can now score up to 800 on each of three sections, or a perfect score of 2400.

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Wake County Public School System, 5625 Dillard Drive, Cary, NC 27518 | 919-431-7400