Many schools already require applicants to submit some form of writing sample; using a standardized writing test will add an estimated $10 to $12 to the cost of test-taking while favoring a certain type of writer.
"They'll help those who can write under pressure and will hurt those who cannot," says Ray Brown, dean of admissions at Texas Christian in Fort Worth, which will require either the SAT or ACT written test. "Many very good writers are good largely because they can take time to write, then rewrite, drafts before generating a final product."
Among the most vocal critics is Robert Schaeffer of the National Center for Fair and Open Testing, a group opposed to standardized tests.
"It's quite silly," Schaeffer says. "If this form of formulaic writing was so important, why did Penn State not require applicants to take the SAT II writing test previously? It was available. Very few colleges, about 35, required it.
"What happened is that the College Board has repackaged their product and the ACT has followed suit ... and found a way to get more students to take a test that colleges didn't find useful enough to require previously."
Kristin Carnahan, a spokeswoman for the College Board, disputes that. She says the College Board considered adding a writing test as early as 1994, but that technology did not yet support the electronic distribution of many thousands of essays.
The new writing test will be similar to the SAT II, with sections for correcting sentences and a written essay, but Carnahan said it wouldn't be the same test.
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