The College Board has announced that it’s making big changes to the SAT. By eliminating it altogether, for the sake of humanity and higher education, you ask? Sadly, no. By simply scoring the exam on a curve, based on everyone’s parents’ net worth? No, that would probably be a bad move, PR-wise.
The biggest change the Board is making to the test is reverting its total score back to 1600 from 2400, to keep it old school—vintage, like the kids like. Other significant changes include “ending the longstanding penalty for guessing wrong, cutting obscure vocabulary words and making the essay optional,” as the New York Times reports. It’s pretty hard to grade essays digitally, so eliminating that part cuts down on labor costs. Phew! Because really, who’s going to do an “optional” essay? Nerds, mostly.