Ultimately, the College Board should consider having students take the Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) online, says a new report. The report was requested in the wake of highly publicized scoring errors that occurred last October. But until the test goes online, steps ranging from better scanning software to more training--and even providing proper pencils and erasers at test centers--could improve the reliability of scoring the SAT exam, according to the report.

The report, commissioned by the College Board and released July 20, says the scoring system for the college entrance test has improved since more than 4,000 SATs taken last October were given incorrectly low scores. On the whole, scores are reliable, according to the report.

But the report by consulting firm Booz Allen Hamilton identifies a series of continuing risks, such as scanners affected by debris or misinterpreting erased marks, and suggests a range of mostly technical steps to provide further safeguards. Overall, the report paints a picture of a less-than-infallible exam, noting several areas where current controls fall short of providing perfect reliability.

The College Board and Pearson Educational Measurement, which scores most of the exams, had previously blamed the October errors on the misreading of "marginal marks" and on answer sheets that expanded because of humidity. Some of the recommendations would address those problems, including additional "anchor marks" on the sheets that reveal whether they have expanded.

In the long run, the report suggests the College Board consider moving the SAT online, something the organization says it has discussed in the past and will consider again, though such a move would raise security concerns.

The report was delivered to the College Board, which owns the SAT, in late May. But the board then backed off a pledge to make the report public, citing litigation on behalf of students whose tests has been misgraded. The College Board changed course after receiving a subpoena from Sen. Kenneth LaValle, chairman of New York's state Senate Higher Education Committee.

Robert Schaeffer, a College Board critic with the group FairTest, attacked the report for failing to provide any new insight into what went wrong with the October exams.

"After all the noise and all the promises, they still haven't answered those questions," he said. "It's going to be another arena where they're answered--presumably the courts."

Other critics of the College Board questioned the independence of Booz Allen, which received $5.2 million in consulting fees from the board in the year ending June 30, 2005, according to a report in the New York Times.

"This isn't the outside independent scrutiny" that is needed, Brad MacGowan, a college counselor in Newton, Mass., told the Times.

College Board spokeswoman Chiara Coletti said the organization already had determined that humidity and problems with so-called "marginal marks" were to blame for the October errors. She said the report was commissioned "to determine if what we put in [as a remedy] was effective, and if we needed to do anything else."