 Hello, my people, my name is Meacham. Welcome to the Score Channel. Should you take the SAT in 2022? The answer is absolutely yes, but the reasons are a little bit complicated. Prior to the pandemic, the SAT was just something you had to do if you wanted to get admitted to universities in the United States. The pandemic forced everything to change because nobody could go to a test center since the test was and still is based on pencil and paper. In response, almost every university in the United States embraced a test optional policy during 2020 and 2021. And many of those universities still have those policies on the books. We're still working on a deeper analysis of the exact impact that test optional policies had on admissions and help you understand whether test optional is real or not. But what is real is the need to take the SAT this year. Let's start with the obvious. Test optional policies were temporary in nature and some universities have already dropped their test optional policy. Even though big universities like Harvard and Yale have committed to going test optional for the foreseeable future, other big names like MIT and Georgia have said that they will require SATs again for 2022 and 2023 applicants. Imagine that you don't take the SAT and then your dream school changes its policy to require it and now you're behind and you can't apply. If you take the SAT this year, you have a result just in case any university changes its policies on you. It's smart, be prepared. There's an even bigger reason on the table here and it's money. Even if all the universities on your list are test optional schools, you could lose out on thousands of dollars in scholarships by not taking the SAT. I recently published an episode of the Dean's List talking about out of state tuition waivers, essentially gigantic scholarships that let international students pay the in-state tuition price at public universities. The majority of those had an SAT requirement. If you don't take the SAT, you wouldn't be eligible for those amazing deals, some of which were worth over $30,000 a year. And even other universities that don't do in-state tuition programs still have scholarships. The University of Tampa, for example, can give you up to $11,000. This is something that a couple of our students missed out on because they chose not to take the SAT. And if you're looking for sports scholarships, then the SAT is basically mandatory. If you wanna sign up for the NCAA, that's the National Collegiate Athletics Association, you need to register with them in order to become a student athlete and get those sweet, sweet sports scholarships. Part of the eligibility rules are that you present an SAT score. If you don't take the SAT, you literally cannot get sports scholarships through the NCAA. It is possible to get them still through the NAIA, but that's a much smaller league and you might still need to present one if your grades are not that great. So not taking the SAT could literally cost you tens of thousands of dollars at the end of the day. It's totally something you should do as an international and domestic student. Doesn't matter where you are from, take the SAT this year. But talking about international students specifically, there is a much, much bigger reason why you should take the SAT in 2022 and not 2023. I talked about this not too long ago on the channel when College Board announced that the SAT would become digital internationally in 2023. This digital change is going to put international students at a big disadvantage and here's why. The current version of the SAT came out in 2016. That means that there are over seven years of material for this paper-based test. You can buy old exams off a College Board. You can buy books from Pearson and Kaplan and other companies. You can use the Khan Academy tools, which are free. There won't be a whole lot of material for the digital SAT that starts in March next year for international students. Now, College Board promises that they will have Khan Academy material out and there have already been some estimates that that will come out in August. But again, what about the other publishers? What about past papers? There won't be any. Preparation for the new version of the SAT is going to be more difficult than preparing for a classic test that we've worked with for seven years. Even teachers, if you decide to sign up for an SAT class like the ones we do here at SCORE, you benefit from the fact that the teacher has worked with that paper test for years. A new digital test is something they haven't worked with either. So how can they teach you a test that they themselves don't understand? I'm still trying to figure that out myself. I don't know what we're gonna do next year. Taking the test digitally next year also presents another problem because if you're applying in 2023 to get admitted for 2024, American students will still be taking the paper test while international students will be taking the digital test. That means that you're going to have two different groups of scores. What if all the internationals just have really high scores because the test is easier and it hasn't been adjusted yet? Will your 1380 be treated the same as a 1380 on the paper test? How will universities compare the two results? I don't know and I don't think that they're just going to say they're all equal because they won't be. The only way to ensure that you are playing on the same ground as American students will be to take a paper SAT in 2023. The only place you'll be able to do that is in the United States, which is why we're already thinking about organizing SAT trips where we traveled to the U.S. to take the test that everybody else is taking. But the other option for you is to just take the paper test in 2022, even if you're planning on applying next year. SAT results are good for two years. There's nothing wrong with presenting a test from a year before. So if you're planning on applying to university in 2022 to start in 2023, you absolutely should take the SAT this year. Just for the scholarship benefits alone, it's a great idea. But if you're thinking about applying next year to go in in 2024, I would also strongly recommend that you prepare and take the paper SAT while you still can. Once this test changes, you're going to be completely in the dark. And hey, you could always take the test at the end of 2022 on paper and then take it again digitally in March 2023. You'll have two results that you could send to universities to show them exactly how prepared you are. Now, the last time College Board changed the SAT, there was a big spike in ACT tests. A lot of people didn't want to try a new SAT. So they stuck with a test that had some years behind it. The only problem with the ACT is that it's a little more difficult because you have to account for a science portion which isn't on the SAT. We're going to continue preparing for the paper SAT while we get ready for the digital SAT. As soon as material comes out that we can take a look at and build courses around, we're going to. And I have every intention of continuing to prepare people for the SAT. That is literally how score got started and it will continue to be a big part of what we do. But my advice to you is genuinely take the paper SAT while you still can. If you can take the paper test this year, do it. If you want to learn more about the changes that are going to happen on that digital SAT you can check out the video I published a couple of months ago. If you do need help with the SAT you can go to prepwithscore.com. I appreciate you watching this. Means a lot to me. Thank you and I will see you next week.