>You could argue the SAT is designed for testing skills that can only/primarily be learned within the current school system

go ahead then and argue using that point, I'd want to know what makes you think so

I've prepared for SAT's equivalent in my country mostly from the youtube videos, so I'm curious what makes you think like that

"that System is designed to keep minorities out"

That is an extraordinary claim to make with such poorly defined terms and lack of evidence.

This argument is parroted constantly regarding many things and not a shred of evidence is ever required.

The evidence is literally in the federal and state legislation passed since late 1800s to support public education with extreme prejudice toward women and minorities. And the subsequent battle to make the system inclusive, culminating with the 1964 Elementary and Secondary Education Act (commonly grouped with “civil rights acts”). And even this law is continuously reauthorized by both sides on the aisle in the name of less discrimination (most recently “No Child Left Behind” and “Every Student Succeeds”).

It is very true that “systemic discrimination” is an argument often parroted without evidence, especially in audiences that prefer rigorous scientific method to be persuaded. But it’s also true that counter arguments often lack evidence that systems are inclusive, and almost never take on anthropological context which take time and effort to build.

> (most recently “No Child Left Behind” and “Every Student Succeeds”)

And now for the worst thing that ever happened to the government education system.

No argument here. Though there’s tough competition for some of those Nixon-Reagan era reauthorizations of ESEA which set the stage for standardized tests being the primary benchmark for everything (and priming the pump for education publishers to create/expand the test prep industry).

People are not arguing SAT is 100% fair, but that it's most fair compared to alternatives.

I agree, it also provides a counterpoint to GPA scores. These scores are not standardized and are subject to school and school district policy.

The math part is not so bad, but I definitely would agree that the verbal/written strongly favors students educated in affluent private schools. You just not going to get that vocab prep down in a poor public school with a lot of minorities. The SAT tests in the language of the US white elite.

It tests in grammatically correct English. Libraries are free. The internet exists. You can't expect a college to cover basic English writing that should have been learned over a lifetime.

> The SAT tests in the language of the US white elite.

How do Asians manage to do well on it? And let me guess, you’re specifically talking about the analogy question that refers to a regatta? That question is repeatedly trotted out as evidence of the SAT’s bias but it, or anything similar, hasn’t been found in the test in decades…

The conclusion of course, in their minds at least, would be that Asians are white. Translate it to academic-speak and you would get something like "Asian benefit from white supremacy"

They go to the same private schools, have friends with, and also speak the language of the aforementioned white elite. I bet the few black kids who go to those schools, have those friends, and come from families who speak that language do pretty damn well too.

Reading books targeted at adults will help immensely with vocabulary. It's fun, too. I read a lot of scifi in high school.

I suspect that the only way to get a large vocabulary is to do a lot of reading. Certainly, watching TV won't do it (TV vocabulary is around 3000 words).

If you have two students of the exact same baseline intelligence. Student A goes to a rich school district and scores well on the SAT. Student B goes to a poor school district and schools poorly on the SAT. That's a problem of the school districts, not of the SAT. Student A is objectively stronger student, and it does no one any favors to try to obscure this.