As thousands of high school juniors attempt to decode their scores after the first trial with the essay-format SAT, controversy rages over the new essay portion. According to The Washington Post, 300,000 students took the new section when it was officially unveiled March 12. Scores were released April 10 on www.collegeboard.com.

While the additional section adds 45 minutes to an already extensive test and changes the final score from a possible 1600 to 2400, the largest debate centers on how the writing section was graded rather than the final results. The writing section consists of a 25-minute essay and a 20-minute multiple-choice language portion.

Les Perelman, a director of undergraduate writing at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, raised serious concerns with the essays’ grading method, according to a column in The New York Times May 4. According to the column, Perelman examined the scores released by the College Board and discovered an uncanny relationship between essay length and score.

Perelman also said that some essays receiving the highest score – a six – had major factual mistakes. The College Board said in response that SATs induce high stress and the focus of the new section is to judge writing ability, not factual citations. The College Board, however, has contradicted itself with the strong correlation between essay length and essay score.

While the idea of an essay is legitimate, the application of this ambitious addition to the standardized test is questionable. The graders recruited to read the essays – high school and college educators with the minimum three years in the field – are expected to spend two to three minutes per essay, according to an article on www.rocketreview.com. This greatly diminishes the graders’ ability to accurately score an essay on more than just length.

But the controversy does not stop there. If students are unsatisfied with their essay score, they can send their essay back to the College Board and pay $50 to have it re-graded. If the score is increased, the student receives the higher score and the $50 is returned. If not, the $50 is not returned.

This entire process suffers from a number of issues. As Perelman said, the essay encourages students to write in great length without being conscious about content. The essay also seems misplaced, considering many colleges now require their own essays with applications in order to accurately judge students’ ability.

Finally, the $50 fee for the regrading process not only disadvantages students with limited financial means, but it gives no incentive to the College Board to reconsider the original, considering they benefit from leaving the score the same or decreasing it.

The addition of the SAT writing section, while admirable, is impractical and ultimately a waste of time as is for both students and college admission offices.