After decades of criticism that standardized testing is culturally biased, officials from the Educational Testing Service (ETS) say they have made great strides in eliminating those biases.

 Officials at ETS, which administers the SATs, PSATs and many of the other standardized tests used by colleges and universities, also say that through their collaborative efforts with national organizations, students of color are now better prepared to take those exams -- and score better on them [see accompanying tables] -- than a generation ago.

 Eleanor Horne, corporate secretary and executive assistant to the president of ETS, says that critics miss the point. She believes that standardized tests which show different average scores between racial/ethnic groups and genders indicate that the exams are doing their job -- which is to show the differences in what the groups know and can do. The tests, she says, do not create the differences.

 Richard Duran, professor in the graduate school of education at the University of California at Santa Barbara, concurs. He says that in terms of academic readiness, the tests are useful because they show that many students of color -- particularly African-Americans and Latinos -- "are underprepared. We have to face up to it. These students have not been treated fairly.... [Their problem is] not being Anglo and coming from the inner city. [The lack of preparedness] is not solely a school problem, but a life-experience issue."

 Review and Modification

Since the 1970s, ETS has had a sensitivity review process to eliminate stereotypes and offensive items. Since the 1980s, ETS has engaged in systematic reviews to ensure fairness in the tests -- checking to see that certain groups are not being given an advantage over others.