The SAT Subject Test in United States History was the name of a one-hour

multiple choice Multiple choice (MC), objective response or MCQ (for multiple choice question) is a form of an objective assessment in which respondents are asked to select only correct answers from the choices offered as a list. The multiple choice format is m ...

test Test(s), testing, or TEST may refer to: * Test (assessment), an educational assessment intended to measure the respondents' knowledge or other abilities Arts and entertainment * ''Test'' (2013 film), an American film * ''Test'' (2014 film), ...

given on

United States History The history of the lands that became the United States began with the arrival of the first people in the Americas around 15,000 BC. Numerous indigenous cultures formed, and many saw transformations in the 16th century away from more densely ...

The College Board The College Board is an American nonprofit organization that was formed in December 1899 as the College Entrance Examination Board (CEEB) to expand access to higher education. While the College Board is not an association of colleges, it runs a ...

. A

student A student is a person enrolled in a school or other educational institution. In the United Kingdom and most commonwealth countries, a "student" attends a secondary school or higher (e.g., college or university); those in primary or elementar ...

chose whether to take the test depending upon

college A college (Latin: ''collegium'') is an educational institution or a constituent part of one. A college may be a degree-awarding tertiary educational institution, a part of a collegiate or federal university, an institution offering ...

entrance requirements for the schools in which the student is planning to apply. Until 1994, the

SAT Subject Tests SAT Subject Tests were 20 multiple-choice standardized tests given by the College Board on individual subjects, typically taken to improve a student's credentials for college admissions in the United States. On January 19, 2021, the College Board ...

were known as Achievement Tests; and from 1995 until January 2005, they were known as SAT IIs. Of all SAT subject tests, United States History was taken the second most, with 119,903 administrations in 2009. On January 19 2021,

the College Board The College Board is an American nonprofit organization that was formed in December 1899 as the College Entrance Examination Board (CEEB) to expand access to higher education. While the College Board is not an association of colleges, it runs a ...

discontinued all

SAT Subject tests SAT Subject Tests were 20 multiple-choice standardized tests given by the College Board on individual subjects, typically taken to improve a student's credentials for college admissions in the United States. On January 19, 2021, the College Board ...

, including the SAT Subject Test in United States History. This was effective immediately in the United States, and the tests were to be phased out by the following summer for international students. This was done as a response to changes in college admissions due to the

impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on education The COVID-19 pandemic affected educational systems worldwide. Most governments decided to temporarily close educational institutions in an attempt to reduce the spread of COVID-19. As of , approximately learners were affected due to school ...

Format

The test had 90 multiple choice questions that were to be answered in one hour. All questions had five answer choices. Students' scores were based entirely on their performance in answering the multiple choice questions. The questions covered a broad range of topics. Approximately 31–35% of questions focused on

political history Political history is the narrative and survey of political events, ideas, movements, organs of government, voters, parties and leaders. It is closely related to other fields of history, including diplomatic history, constitutional history, social ...

, 13–17% focused on

economic history Economic history is the academic learning of economies or economic events of the past. Research is conducted using a combination of historical methods, statistical methods and the application of economic theory to historical situations and ins ...

, 20–24% focused on

social history Social history, often called the new social history, is a field of history that looks at the lived experience of the past. In its "golden age" it was a major growth field in the 1960s and 1970s among scholars, and still is well represented in his ...

, 13–17% focused on

intellectual An intellectual is a person who engages in critical thinking, research, and reflection about the reality of society, and who proposes solutions for the normative problems of society. Coming from the world of culture, either as a creator or a ...

and

cultural history Cultural history combines the approaches of anthropology and history to examine popular cultural traditions and cultural interpretations of historical experience. It examines the records and narrative descriptions of past matter, encompassing the ...

, and 13–17% focused on

foreign policy A State (polity), state's foreign policy or external policy (as opposed to internal or domestic policy) is its objectives and activities in relation to its interactions with other states, unions, and other political entities, whether bilaterall ...

. The questions also varied with respect to time period; approximately 20% focused on the period of the

Pre-Columbian era In the history of the Americas, the pre-Columbian era spans from the Migration to the New World, original settlement of North and South America in the Upper Paleolithic period through European colonization of the Americas, European colonization, w ...

to 1789, 40% focused on the period between 1790 and 1898, and 40% focused on the period between 1899 and the present day.

Scoring

For each of the multiple choice questions, students received 1 point for every correct answer, lost of a point for each incorrect answer, and received 0 points for questions left blank. This created a ''raw score'', which was then converted into a ''scaled score''. The conversion between these numbers varied depending on the difficulty of a particular test administration. The ''scaled score'' was the only score reported to either students or colleges and ranges from 200 to 800, with 800 being the best possible score. The

mean There are several kinds of mean in mathematics, especially in statistics. Each mean serves to summarize a given group of data, often to better understand the overall value (magnitude and sign) of a given data set. For a data set, the ''arithme ...

and

standard deviation In statistics, the standard deviation is a measure of the amount of variation or dispersion of a set of values. A low standard deviation indicates that the values tend to be close to the mean (also called the expected value) of the set, while ...

of the test scores in 2009 were 599 and 115, respectively.

Preparation

The College Board suggested as preparation for the test a year-long course in United States History at the college preparatory level. The test required understanding of historical data and concepts,

cause and effect Causality (also referred to as causation, or cause and effect) is influence by which one event, process, state, or object (''a'' ''cause'') contributes to the production of another event, process, state, or object (an ''effect'') where the cau ...

relationships,

geography Geography (from Greek: , ''geographia''. Combination of Greek words ‘Geo’ (The Earth) and ‘Graphien’ (to describe), literally "earth description") is a field of science devoted to the study of the lands, features, inhabitants, and ...

, and the ability to effectively synthesize and interpret data from charts, maps, and other

visual media Mass media refers to a diverse array of media technologies that reach a large audience via mass communication. The technologies through which this communication takes place include a variety of outlets. Broadcast media transmit information e ...

. However, most questions from this test were derived from/similar to the

AP US History Advanced Placement (AP) United States History (also known as AP U.S. History or APUSH () is a college-level course and examination offered by College Board as part of the Advanced Placement Program. Course The AP U.S. History course is designed ...

Multiple Choice questions from 2014 and earlier (the 2015 exam has been revised). By taking an AP class, IB History of the Americas, or a class with similar rigor, the chances at doing well on this test were much improved.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Sat Subject Test In United States History

History of the United States

Format

Scoring

Preparation

See also

References