The SAT Subject Test in Spanish is a standardized test given by the College Board that assesses fluency in Spanish among high school students. It is typically taken after three to four years of studying the language, once the student has reached a significantly level of understanding and competence in it. The test also partially emphasizes preparation for AP Spanish and/or Spanish as a course in College. Passage selections are drawn from prose fiction, historical works, and newspaper and magazine articles, as well as advertisements, flyers and letters.
Test
The test is one hour long and is composed of 85 multiple choice questions. It is scored on a scale from 200 to 800, as all are SAT Subject Tests. This test is offered five times annually and does not include a listening section, which can be found on a separate but similar test, the SAT Subject Test in Spanish with Listening. The listening test is only offered once every year. According to the College Board, the three overall topics on the test are evenly divided among the 85 questions, with each comprising about a third of the test. They are as follows:
Knowledge of words that represent different parts of speech along with some basic expressions within culturally appropriate contexts.
Ability to select appropriate grammatically correct words and/or expressions in order to complete a sentence. A section of the test contains vocabulary and structure questions embedded within longer paragraphs.
Understanding of similar points of a passage.
Scoring
This test is no different from any other SAT Subject Test in language, so all "standard scoring methods" apply, including:
Each correct answer is worth 1 point
Each answer left blank neither adds nor deducts points to the score
Each incorrect answer subtracts 0.25 points away from the final grade
It is possible to get a perfect score on the exam while leaving some answers blank, depending on how well one does on each section. The mean score on this test is a 653. 18,161 students took the test in 2016.
