The College Board announced last week that the biggest changes to the SAT test since 2005 are soon to come. While the SAT is the top choice to take by students on the East coast, students from all over the nation still take the test. Changes like a now optional essay opposed to a mandatory one and no penalties for wrong answers are a few of the multiple changes coming.

The essay portion on the SAT will become optional rather than mandatory. School district memeners and colleges will help students decide whether or not they need to take the essay portion.

Since it’s been 9 years since the last update of the SAT test, commonly used vocabulary has changed, and the College Board has realized that. The SAT plans on doing away with outrageous vocab words that students get tested on. The College Board plans to replace some current words with words more commonly used in the school setting in hopes that this will truly quiz students on vocabulary used in their daily life.

Another big change to the SAT is the fact that the test will be available in digital forms. The new SAT will also have a shorter test time with a total of 3 hours and a separate fifty minutes for the optional essay portion.

Other changes to the SAT include documents on the test being from founding documents of America, such as the Declaration of Independence, and a new scoring scale.

New changes are set to start in the spring of 2016.