Finding site for an SAT is now its own challenge

“Some of them are driving eight hours to go to a test center, which is crazy, because that’s the exact opposite thing you want to do before a test,” Makan said.

“Even flying to L.A. and taking mine there was so disruptive,” Makan said. “Going through the airport, finding a hotel and a way to the test center, it adds so much more stress onto the fact that you’re taking a 2 1/2 hour test that affects your college admissions.”

According to the College Board’s SAT Test Center Search, the national August SAT is not offered anywhere in San Mateo County. Beginning in October, Carlmont High School in Belmont is the only national testing site on the Peninsula — but seats have already been fully booked through the end of the 2024-25 testing cycle.

There are a few testing centers surrounding the county. However, these seats fill up months in advance, as they are sought after by students across the Bay Area who want to take the SAT — which is optional or not accepted at many universities, but required by some.

As of August 2024, there is only one testing center within 100 miles of San Mateo County that has open seats through the end of this college application season.

The College Board does add test centers from time to time, and sometimes spots seem to randomly appear, said Aaron Andrikopoulous, co-founder of AJ Tutoring, a Bay Area based tutoring company. You need to constantly monitor the page to get one, he said.

“It’s like getting tickets to a concert, it can be really challenging to get one of those coveted seats,” Andrikopoulous said.

“We have some students who just decide, after trying to register several times, to forgo taking it, which can potentially impact their college opportunities,” Andrikopoulous said.

Why is this happening?

Test availability in the Bay Area was not a problem before the pandemic, Andrikopoulous said. Students used to be able to decide to register at the last minute and could still sit for the exam, he said.

The pandemic forced testing centers to close throughout the country. Though many came back pretty early on, centers in California were especially slow at reopening because of California’s strict COVID guidelines, Andrikopoulous said.

At the same time, colleges and universities were moving to test-optional admissions. The University of California system eventually stopped accepting test scores entirely, a spokesperson for the College Board said in a statement. Because of this, many of the schools in the Bay Area that had served as national test centers before the pandemic decided not to reopen at all, they said.

What now?

The College Board is doing everything it can to ensure all students who want the opportunity can take the test, the spokesperson said. The organization is encouraging current test centers to increase capacity, asking closed centers to reopen, calling on schools to become new test sites and setting up centers in nontraditional locations like hotels in the Bay Area, they said.

For the August SAT, the College Board has added at least 2,500 seats in the Bay Area and at least 4,700 seats across California, the spokesperson said.

Before the pandemic, San Mateo Union High School District facilities served as national testing centers — meaning the College Board rented out space for registered students to take the test — but have not since, Brian Simmons, director of Curriculum and Assessment, said.

Since the College Board administers the national test, the district isn’t involved with test availability, Simmons said. He added that the district would rent space to the College Board if it reached out again.

The College Board did reach out last spring, but was unwilling to work with the district’s insurance, Simmons said. When the issue was finally resolved, the test date was too soon to organize properly.

No one from the College Board has contacted the district since then, Simmons said.

The district’s facilities, and those of most high schools, are often reserved on the weekends for events, Simmons said. If the College Board truly wants to increase test availability, it needs to reach out much further in advance, he said.

‘SAT School Day’

Though the national test is organized by the College Board, schools or districts are able to administer the standardized test through the “SAT School Day.” Like the name suggests, these tests are typically held instead of classes during a school day.

Only students who attend that school/school in that district can take it on that day, as opposed to the national test offered by the College Board, which anyone can take if they register.

The district is offering the school day test this fall, though unconventionally. Students in the district can take the test on Oct. 26 and March 15 — both Saturdays.

“Given the broader context of SAT value to students — 90% of our students go to a public college in California, none of which take the SAT — it doesn’t make sense to take up a full school day for it,” Simmons said.

Offering the test on a Saturday allows district students who want to take the test to have a guaranteed spot to do so, while others don’t have to worry about it, Simmons said.

Impact of uncertainty

The current uncertainty surrounding the SAT’s importance at colleges and universities across the country affects how many schools decide to approach the exam.

Makan’s school counselor told her that they don’t offer the school day test because they don’t want to pressure their students to submit.

If a student has easy access to the SAT because it is offered at their school, and they choose not to submit their scores, admissions officers who can see this might assume that the student tested poorly, the counselor said.

By not offering the test, students who don’t want to submit scores don’t need to. Students who do want to submit scores can take the test somewhere else, the counselor said.

But when the closest center is across the state, only students with the means to travel can take the test. 

A 2023 study showed a high correlation between students’ SAT scores and their parents’ incomes. The study, which analyzed test scores from the 2010s, demonstrated that students in the top 20% are seven times more likely to score high (at least 1300) as students in the bottom 20%.

It also showed that pre-pandemic, only 1 in 5 students in the poorest families took the test at all. If one needs to book a hotel or purchase a plane ticket to take the test, even students who want to take the test might not be able to.

Though students’ interest in taking the SAT remains strong, there are fewer than half the number of testing centers in California than there were pre-pandemic, the College Board spokesperson said.

“We’re kind of the guinea pigs this year,” Makan said. “This is the first year the SAT is digital and the first year the Ivies and competitive schools are bringing back SAT requirements. But on top of all that, we can’t even find a place to take it.”