O.C. Students Exceed SAT National Average

Orange County high school seniors continued to score above the state and national averages on the Scholastic Assessment Test, with Irvine Unified once again posting the highest marks among the county’s high school districts, according to SAT scores released Thursday.

Several districts in the county improved their average scores considerably, including Fullerton Joint Union, Newport-Mesa Unified and Santa Ana Unified.

The scores were helped by a controversial new scoring scale, which curves the numbers upward to reflect the diversity in today’s school population.

The SAT exams, which are a major criterion used in the college admissions process by most colleges and universities, consist of verbal and math sections, each scored on a scale of 200 to 800.

The majority of Orange County students surpassed the state and national combined average scores of 1,006 and 1,013, respectively. Irvine Unified’s combined average was 1,128.

“It’s a sign we’re continuing to do the right types of things,” Irvine Unified Supt. Dennis Smith said. “One of the key factors in our success in Irvine is the fact that we have such motivated students and highly involved parents. The kids come ready to learn. Clearly, we are in a community that values education.”

Although Santa Ana posted the lowest total combined average of 878, four of its five schools improved significantly this year. Saddleback High School, for instance, jumped to 446 in the verbal test, an increase of 20 points.

“Although we’re still concerned that our test scores are below state and national norms, we believe that we’re making progress and support all efforts to continue the positive trends we’ve been experiencing,” Santa Ana Unified School Supt. Al Mijares said.

Fullerton Joint Union showed the single greatest improvement in SAT scores in Orange County this year with a 13-point leap in the verbal section and a 16-point rise in the math score.

“We’re very pleased with the scores,” said Robert Anderson, assistant superintendent. “More of our students are taking more academically challenging programs, and some of that is showing up in our test results.”

Fullerton High School, often eclipsed in its district by high-achieving Sunny Hills High, saw its seniors raise their verbal SAT average score to 530 this year, a 33-point increase over 1995.

The largest slide in any score was in the Anaheim Union School District, where Kennedy High School’s math score fell 74 points from last year to 456.

At Newport-Mesa Unified, where verbal and math scores shot up significantly, Supt. Mac Bernd praised the numbers but was more interested in analyzing scores over the long haul.

“The magnitude of the increase is not as important as the trend,” Bernd said. “We’ve had an upward trend in Newport-Mesa over the last couple years. Our students are working hard and our teachers are focused on the right things.”

Saddleback Valley, which has steadily increased its scores in each of the last four years, backtracked on both exams at almost every school. Overall, the district scores fell modestly by four points in the verbal section and one point in math.

Proud Capistrano Unified administrators boasted of the district’s improvement this year, which earned it 1,103 points, its highest total ever.

“This is a remarkable achievement,” Capistrano Unified Supt. James Fleming said. “Given these scores, our administrators and teachers are rightfully proud of this exemplary academic performance by our high school students.”

But officials with the College Board, a private group that administers the SAT, warned that this year’s figures are significantly higher because of the new scaling system that has shifted the mean score to 500 on a scale of 200 to 800. Under the old scale, a 450 mean score meant above-average performance on verbal but below-average performance on math.

“Re-centering” the scores better reflect the performance of a pool of test takers that is growing and becoming more diverse, College Board spokesman Jeffery Penn said.

“The test-taking population has increased and the demographic pool has broadened” since the test was first administered in 1941, Penn said.

“We re-centered the scores so that they hover back over 500 to help students and college-admission directors better understand where the students stand among their peers,” he said.

The SAT exams were offered in 1941 to about 10,000 students, most of whom were men in the Northeast and were attending college preparatory schools, Penn said. They averaged 500 on both the verbal and math tests, and that figure has since been used as the reference mean. But the average scores kept dipping. For example, the math scores dipped to 476 in 1990.

“There’s nothing magical about the 500 number,” said Robert L. Linn, an education professor at the University of Colorado at Boulder, and co-director of UCLA’s Center for Research and Evaluation, Standards and Student Testing.

“There was nothing special about that group that took the test,” he said. “Many of them tended to be kids going to Ivy league colleges and other private schools. They weren’t very representative of the students across the country.”

Although the re-centering method has helped inflate SAT scores, Linn said the ranking of individual students among their peers will not change.

“This doesn’t mean that the test is easier or that students are faring better,” Linn said. “The College Board has been criticized for lowering its standards, but the reference numbers had become outdated. I don’t know if the change was needed but it was done for a good reason.”

Education experts emphasized that the SAT tests are used to measure the ability to reason and one’s potential in college or a university.

“We’re not talking about an intelligence test here,” Penn said. “SAT scores are meant to measure reasoning skills. It’s not directly relative to the high school curriculum or course work. It’s not measuring achievement.”

Also contributing to this report was Times correspondent Jeff Kass.

* FULLERTON ON RISE: District’s improvement is most dramatic in the county. A27

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SAT Scores

Orange County seniors generally scored better than their peers in California and nationwide on the Scholastic Assessment Test. The results:

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1996 1995 Change District Verbal Math Verbal Math Verbal Math Anaheim Union n/a n/a * * n/a n/a Anaheim 430 467 415 447 15 20 Cypress 500 553 507 546 -7 7 Katella 485 535 478 546 7 -11 Kennedy 500 456 484 530 16 -74 Loara 480 524 * * n/a n/a Magnolia n/a n/a * * n/a n/a Savanna 475 515 469 513 6 2 Western 476 519 * * n/a n/a Brea Olinda Unified** 528 567 509 561 19 6 Capistrano Unified 540 563 536 556 4 7 Aliso Niguel 529 570 542 559 -13 11 Capistrano Valley 542 561 526 556 16 5 Dana Hills 556 569 542 556 14 13 San Clemente 530 552 535 554 -5 -2 Fullerton Joint Union 522 557 509 541 13 16 Buena Park 446 453 442 472 4 -19 Fullerton 530 518 497 507 33 11 La Habra 497 513 498 505 -1 8 Sonora 505 518 488 506 17 12 Sunny Hills 535 602 538 596 -3 6 Troy 550 590 528 565 22 25 Garden Grove Unified 465 529 478 521 -13 8 Bolsa Grande 463 545 465 541 -2 4 Garden Grove 467 530 490 521 -23 9 La Quinta 450 539 501 543 -51 -4 Los Amigos 469 527 441 504 -28 23 Pacifica 517 539 512 530 5 9 Rancho Alamitos 456 529 474 513 -18 16 Santiago 426 485 432 491 -6 -6 Huntington Beach Union 523 554 * * n/a n/a Edison 530 559 * * n/a n/a Fountain Valley 526 570 * * n/a n/a Huntington Beach 525 546 * * n/a n/a Marina 537 565 * * n/a n/a Ocean View 534 542 * * n/a n/a Westminster 537 565 * * n/a n/a Irvine Unified 540 588 535 591 5 -3 Irvine 533 578 * * n/a n/a University 565 612 * * n/a n/a Woodbridge 577 568 * * n/a n/a Laguna Beach Unified** 547 548 * * n/a n/a Los Alamitos Unified** 529 556 534 567 -5 -9 Newport-Mesa Unified 541 573 528 558 13 15 Corona Del Mar 559 589 * * n/a n/a Costa Mesa 511 562 * * n/a n/a Estancia 546 560 * * n/a n/a Newport Harbor 530 561 * * n/a n/a Orange Unified 523 552 523 552 0 0 Canyon 528 550 532 559 -4 -9 El Modena 526 551 524 552 2 1 Orange 480 519 486 512 -6 7 Villa Park 538 571 531 566 7 5 Placentia-Yorba Linda Unified 524 559 515 548 9 11 El Dorado 528 560 509 544 19 16 Esperanza 523 563 515 548 8 15 Valencia 522 545 526 553 -4 -8 Saddleback Valley Unified 533 559 537 560 -4 -1 El Toro 530 551 541 559 -11 -8 Laguna Hills 546 585 550 579 -4 6 Mission Viejo 529 551 532 557 -3 -6 Trabuco Hills 527 547 524 546 3 1 Santa Ana Unified 420 458 409 448 11 10 Century 425 440 407 419 18 21 Saddleback 446 478 426 460 20 18 Santa Ana 387 443 390 445 -3 -2 Valley 410 458 395 458 15 0 Tustin Unified 518 546 518 540 0 6 Foothill 554 590 540 569 14 21 Tustin 481 501 496 510 -15 -9 California average 495 511 497 511 -2 0 National average 505 508 507 508 -2 0

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* Figures have not been recalculated to reflect an upward curve in last year’s scores.

** Only one high school in district

Source: Individual school districts

Researched by TINA NGUYEN / Los Angeles Times

State SATs

SAT scores have risen slightly but steadily in the past three years among California’s high school seniors.

1995-96

Math: 511

Verbal: 495