State SAT Scores 2009
The College Board released today the 2009 SAT Scores by State. They strongly encourage people to look at the data stand alone yet it seems everyone wants to see the SAT Rankings by State. We picked them up from a variety of news sources and present them to you with caution. Some states have low participation rates and arguably can tilt the field. We will follow up with some analysis in a future post. Also see our post Does Increased Spending on Higher Education lead to Better State University Rankings?
Top SAT State Scores include Iowa, Wisconsin, Minnesota and Missouri. These States primarily have their students take the ACT test so their numbers may not be representative of the entire state.
The Worst States for SAT Scores include Maine, Hawaii, South Carolina, Georgia and New York. DC is also very low.
Here is the ranking of SAT Scores by State List:
2009 State Sat Scores
Source: College Board and various news services Rate: Student Population Rate as reported by www.collegeboard.com
Top SAT State Scores include Iowa, Wisconsin, Minnesota and Missouri. These States primarily have their students take the ACT test so their numbers may not be representative of the entire state.
The Worst States for SAT Scores include Maine, Hawaii, South Carolina, Georgia and New York. DC is also very low.
Here is the ranking of SAT Scores by State List:
2009 State Sat Scores
| Rate | Reading | Math | Writing | Total | ||
| 1 | Iowa | 3% | 610 | 615 | 588 | 1813 |
| 2 | Wisconsin | 5% | 594 | 608 | 582 | 1784 |
| 3 | Minnesota | 7% | 595 | 609 | 578 | 1782 |
| 4 | Missouri | 5% | 595 | 600 | 584 | 1779 |
| 5 | Illinois | 6% | 588 | 604 | 583 | 1775 |
| 6 | Michigan | 5% | 584 | 603 | 575 | 1762 |
| 7 | South Dakota | 3% | 589 | 600 | 569 | 1758 |
| 8 | Nebraska | 4% | 587 | 594 | 572 | 1753 |
| 9 | North Dakota | 3% | 590 | 593 | 566 | 1749 |
| 10 | Kansas | 7% | 581 | 589 | 564 | 1734 |
| 11 | Kentucky | 7% | 573 | 573 | 561 | 1707 |
| 12 | Oklahoma | 5% | 575 | 571 | 557 | 1703 |
| 13 | Tennessee | 10% | 571 | 565 | 565 | 1701 |
| 14 | Arkansas | 5% | 572 | 572 | 556 | 1700 |
| 15 | Colorado | 20% | 568 | 575 | 555 | 1698 |
| 16 | Wyoming | 5% | 567 | 568 | 550 | 1685 |
| 17 | Mississippi | 4% | 567 | 554 | 559 | 1680 |
| 18 | Louisiana | 7% | 563 | 558 | 555 | 1676 |
| 19 | Alabama | 7% | 557 | 552 | 549 | 1658 |
| 20 | Utah | 6% | 559 | 558 | 540 | 1657 |
| 21 | New Mexico | 11% | 553 | 546 | 534 | 1633 |
| 22 | Ohio | 22% | 537 | 546 | 523 | 1606 |
| 23 | Montana | 22% | 541 | 542 | 519 | 1602 |
| 24 | Idaho | 18% | 541 | 540 | 520 | 1601 |
| 25 | Washington | 53% | 524 | 531 | 507 | 1563 |
| 26 | New Hampshire | 75% | 523 | 523 | 510 | 1557 |
| 27 | Massachusetts | 84% | 514 | 526 | 510 | 1551 |
| 28 | Oregon | 52% | 523 | 525 | 499 | 1548 |
| 29 | Vermont | 64% | 518 | 518 | 506 | 1543 |
| 30 | Connecticut | 83% | 509 | 513 | 512 | 1535 |
| 31 | Arizona | 26% | 516 | 521 | 497 | 1534 |
| 32 | Alaska | 46% | 520 | 516 | 492 | 1528 |
| 33 | Virginia | 68% | 511 | 512 | 498 | 1522 |
| 34 | California | 49% | 500 | 513 | 498 | 1511 |
| 35 | West Virginia | 18% | 511 | 501 | 499 | 1511 |
| 36 | New Jersey | 76% | 496 | 513 | 496 | 1506 |
| 37 | Maryland | 69% | 500 | 502 | 495 | 1498 |
| 38 | Rhode Island | 66% | 498 | 496 | 494 | 1489 |
| 39 | North Carolina | 63% | 495 | 511 | 480 | 1487 |
| 40 | Nevada | 42% | 501 | 505 | 479 | 1485 |
| 41 | Indiana | 63% | 496 | 507 | 480 | 1484 |
| 42 | Delaware | 71% | 495 | 498 | 484 | 1478 |
| 43 | Pennsylvania | 71% | 493 | 501 | 483 | 1478 |
| 44 | Florida | 59% | 497 | 498 | 480 | 1476 |
| 45 | Texas | 51% | 486 | 506 | 475 | 1468 |
| 46 | New York | 85% | 485 | 502 | 478 | 1466 |
| 47 | Georgia | 71% | 490 | 491 | 479 | 1461 |
| 48 | South Carolina | 67% | 486 | 496 | 470 | 1453 |
| 49 | Hawaii | 58% | 479 | 502 | 469 | 1451 |
| 50 | Maine | 90% | 468 | 467 | 455 | 1391 |
| 51 | DC | 79% | 466 | 451 | 461 | 1379 |
| All Students | 46% | 501 | 515 | 493 | 1509 |
Posted by Ed Kopko at 8/25/2009 9:28 PM 
Categories: South Carolina, Education, Hawaii, Georgia, Maine, Wisconsin, Iowa, Minnesota, New York, District of Columbia, Missouri
Tags: List of State SAT Scores State SAT Scores 2009 State SAT Scores Best States for Sat Scores Top SAT Scores
Categories: South Carolina, Education, Hawaii, Georgia, Maine, Wisconsin, Iowa, Minnesota, New York, District of Columbia, Missouri
Tags: List of State SAT Scores State SAT Scores 2009 State SAT Scores Best States for Sat Scores Top SAT Scores
This list is useless.
Did you notice that all the top ten states on that list are from the Northern Midwest? That's because the typical students in midwestern places like Iowa and Wisconsin don't take the SAT, they take the other admissions test (the ACT). The only kids in Iowa who take the SAT are the ones who plan to apply out of state, to Ivy league schools. Naturally, those kids score high.
Meanwhile, in places like Connecticut or Vermont or New Jersey or California, the ACT is not given, and everyone (including the morons) takes the SAT even if they only plan to go to community college.
This ranking almost entirely correlates with the percentage of the students who take the ACT versus the SAT, nothing more. It's horribly misleading.
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Why do other states use textbooks designed to Texas standards? With scores like that -- I'd think Texas would be close to the last state I'd want designing my kid's educational materials.
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It's pure economics: Texas is large and populous so it orders so many text books that it can dictate the content. Smaller, less populous have to buy what's available. Unfortunately, The Texas Board is packed with ideologues and not educators.
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This is not at all a representative set of statistics. By my count, there were 10 states that had a rate of 70% or more. We could even extend it to the states with 50% or more. But I would certainly not count any state with less than 50% of its students taking this test. If you notice, all of the top states had the lowest number of takers and all of the bottom states had the highest rates. Massachusetts should probably be ranked highest for having one of the highest ratios of takers to scorers.
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Kindly allow me to add one question:
How to educate those "minority" kids "better" ?
Eliminate standards totally & then proceed to define everyone as equal a
priority and by definition. E.g. when the SAT doesn't produce equal
outcome, it is a racist test. When groups average different on IQ tests
intelligence is therefore merely some social construct and doesn't exist
etc etc.
From a practical point though the best cure is still prevention.
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While I will agree that this list present the "numbers" in a skewed fashion (don't all numbers? - the answer to that is yes, I was a math major, I should know).
However, it's a typically elitist (and coastal) comment to insinuate that ACT test takers are morons, and that community college bound kids are less than smart. We ended up in Missouri from more progressive and (we thought) more educationally centered communities. We were quite happy to be proven wrong. Missouri has some excellent educational districts (not KCMO of course) but plenty of awesome things are going on in the state. Our own college bound child took both the SAT & the ACT, did quite well on both and is a junior on a full tuition scholarship at Missouri, majoring in Journalism (top J school in the nation, thank you very much). Meanwhile, some friends of this child went to community colleges after doing well on the SAT and/or ACT, not because they had to attend the local college, and obviously not because they were lacking in big campus smarts, but rather because the central Midwest is a very practical sort of area and their parents don't believe in BIG debt.
Stop looking down your nose, get out and live a little. Never ceases to amaze me, how "worldly" people think themselves to be, while knowing so little about their own world (i.e. country).
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The reason that Texas drives the textbook market has nothing to do with academics. The Texas is typically the largest buyer of textbooks and either the publishers tailor their books to make sure that they adhere to Texas' curriculum standards or they won't be able to sell them in Texas. S
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This is not at all a representative set of statistics. By my count, there were 10 states that had a rate of 70% or more. We could even extend it to the states with 50% or more. But I would certainly not count any state with less than 50% of its students taking this test. If you notice, all of the top states had the lowest number of takers and all of the bottom states had the highest rates. Massachusetts should probably be ranked highest for having one of the highest ratios of takers to scorers.
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When I did my own manual ranking they do not match the rankings above. I used statistics available here: http://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d09/tables/dt09_146.asp
How do you contact someone at this site to find out why the difference???
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"E.g. when the SAT doesn't produce equal
outcome, it is a racist test. When groups average different on IQ tests
intelligence is therefore merely some social construct and doesn't exist
etc etc."
@vitun: Socioeconomic inequality falls on a racial line, and socioeconomic status is the strongest predictor of standardized test scores. Therefore, you cannot conclude that the ACT/SAT are racist. That said, according to FairTest, even when background is controlled for race there is some inequity along racial lines-- it is not huge, but it may indicate bias of the test.
I think a stronger case to make than that the tests are racist is whether they truly mean anything. A GPA is a better predictor of future college success than test scores, even between schools.
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