Last night I talked with my SAT Math Tutor trainer after training. He informed me of some industry news...the top end private SAT Trainers charge from $250 and up to $710 per HOUR of SAT training. That's more than high end lawyers, as far as I know. Wow! Of course, that is such a select market, it probably has virtually nil effect on anyone other than the elite few, but it points to the obvious problem with SAT testing favoring wealthier students over poorer ones (as it always has to various degrees). The private tutoring industry just highlights the point.

What concerns me, however, beyond the unfairness (life's unfair, so what) is what the test tests. It tests Aptitude, and some will argue poorly. But the questions we should ask is: Aptitude for WHAT? In doing this training, we mechanize the process of taking the SAT. The best way to succeed at the test is to mechanically be able to follow different rules for different situations, applying rote techniques to specific problems. It's breaking down problems into specific tasks - preparing us to be members of assembly lines, or rather, managing assembly lines - applying some rules to wigit production 1 and other rules to wigit production 2.

It seems to me a boring world in which we've valued the ability to follow specific rules for specific situations, irrespective of creativity, spontaneity, or other types of reasoning, ie spacial, etc not tested on the SAT. It's actually quite sad in some respects.

But then again, it's only test.