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It gets worse. The College Board offers some speculative reasons about why some students are college-ready and others are not. One is that more college-ready students took the PSAT. (Guess who sells the PSAT.) Another is that college-ready students took more AP tests. (Guess who sells AP tests.) Still another is that more college-ready students completed a “core curriculum.” (Guess who will be selling tests based on the Common Core national standards.)

Those students who met the SAT College and Career Readiness Benchmark had a
number of critically important academic characteristics that must be shared by all
students if our nation is to make meaningful gains in educational attainment.
This year’s report highlights characteristics of these students to help demonstrate
successful patterns that can be replicated in schools and districts throughout the country.

Students who met the SAT College and Career Readiness Benchmark were more
likely to have completed a core curriculum, which is defined as four or more years of
English, three or more years of mathematics, three or more years of natural science,
and three or more years of social science and history. However, of the students who
completed a core curriculum (75 percent), only 49 percent met the SAT Benchmark,
indicating a need for more rigorous core courses.

Students who met the SAT College and Career Readiness Benchmark were more
likely to have taken honors or AP courses, more likely to have taken higher-level
mathematics courses (e.g., precalculus, calculus, and trigonometry), and more likely
to be in the top 10 percent of their high school graduating class than their peers who
did not meet the SAT Benchmark.