Welcome to the SAT, Kentucky Juniors
If there is one thing you can count on in education, it’s change. Often, that change is definitely for the better because we need to innovate to address students’ needs. In Kentucky, there is a new change that is coming for the 2025-2026 school year and beyond (until it changes again!!) that I want to make sure parents know about.
In Kentucky, for many years, the ACT has been the vendor for standardized testing during high schoolers. Schools administer the test during spring of students’ junior year during the school day. This is a nice option because it guarantees access to testing and students do not have to pay the fee. Kentucky Department of Education is going to continue this testing, with one major change. This information was released JUne 30, 2025 via the District Assessment Coordinators (DAC).
The vendor will now be the SAT. I guess given my website name, I will start to focus significantly on the ‘and more…..’ part.
If your students is a rising senior, this does not affect them at all. They are good to go. They have most likely prepped for the ACT, taken the ACT etc. And, if they want to keep doing that for their college applications, they absolutely should.
However, for students who are rising juniors or younger, the school-based test will be the SAT. What does that mean for them?
During the spring of their junior year, they will take the SAT at school.
They can still take the ACT if they prefer it or if they tend to perform better on it, based on percentile rankings.
They should prep for the SAT because they WILL take this test.
They can prep for the ACT if they think they will want to take both.
Per the DAC email, “The SAT Junior State Administration is an adaptive exam. It is a two hour and 14-minute exam that assesses students’ reading, writing, math, and science skills. The test has two sections, Reading & Writing and Math, generating a score for each section on a 200-800 scale. Through its unique design, the SAT also delivers an Analysis in Science score generated by students’ performance on relevant questions within the Reading & Writing and Math sections.”
The academic benchmark scores are available here. DAC indicated that there will be training opportunities for educators and administrators.
In the meantime, you know I have ordered my official SAT book and I will begin studying so I may be able to provide high-quality support for students taking either test.