South Carolina’s average SAT score will rank last among the 50 states when a nationwide report on 2004 college entrance exam results is made public next week, the state education superintendent said Friday.

Inez Tenenbaum disclosed how S.C.’s latest high school graduates measured up on the test as a preemptive move that she acknowledged was motivated by concern the performance could become an election-year issue.

“It’s unfortunate that people will delight in seeing scores go down,” said Tenenbaum, who predicted the three-point decline in the test scores will be fodder for campaign ads criticizing her.

Tenenbaum is the Democratic party’s candidate for the U.S. Senate seat held by Fritz Hollings, who retires this year. Her opponent is Rep. Jim DeMint, R.S.C., from Greenville.

DeMint’s campaign manager told the Associated Press Friday the drop in SAT scores is not a political issue. “Let’s find a way to fix it,” Terry Sullivan said.

Tenenbaum said the average SAT score for the class of 2004, which graduated this spring, was 986 compared to 989 a year ago. The 2003 national average was 1,083; the maximum score is 1,600.

“It’s the first time in six years we’ve had a dip,” she said.

Her decision to talk about the drop in scores before next week’s announcement triggered a response from Gov. Mark Sanford, whose staff requested a briefing from the association that owns the test.

Sanford called the latest results “unacceptable” and took the opportunity to promote school reform proposals that have yet to gain support from the Legislature.

“Whether it’s charter school reform or our ‘Put Parents in Charge’ (voucher) proposal, this administration is going to continue pushing for fundamental reforms to the current system that give parents more choices and kids more opportunities,” Sanford said through a spokesman. “We’re also going to continue our efforts to bring about real funding reforms and Cabinet-level accountability at the Department of Education.”

Paul Krohne, director of the S.C. School Boards Association, called the score decline “a glancing blow, not a knockout punch.”

“I hope this doesn’t add fuel to the fire to those interested in dismantling the good things we have going on” in public schools, Krohne said.

The SAT report posted the year Tenenbaum took office in 1999 was 954, which ranked South Carolina at the bottom of the nation.

In the intervening years, scores made what Tenenbaum and her deputies characterize as “historic” gains — until this past year.

“There is not really one factor you can pinpoint” as the cause of the decline, Tenenbaum said.

She said the 2004 average score would place South Carolina 50th among the states, a blow to leading education advocates who pledged in 1998 that the state’s school system should be ranked among the nation’s top 25 by 2010.

“I don’t think we have to over-react to it,” Tenenbaum said.

SAT results are among several ways educators gauge academic achievement and progress toward long-range goals.

The state Department of Education will release preliminary results from Palmetto Achievement Challenge Tests next month that Tenenbaum said will show an improvement over scores from 2003. PACTs are given to students in grades three through eight and test material taught in math, English-language arts, science and social studies.

Over the past several years, South Carolina students who have taken national standardized tests have performed on par with, or in some cases, above their peers in other states, Tenenbaum noted.

The 3-point drop in the state’s average SAT score notwithstanding, Tenenbaum said South Carolina can boast it has produced the nation’s best rate of improvement on its average score over the past five years.

She declared a net 32-point gain during her 5½-year tenure as the state’s top education policy leader “the good news.”

Colleges and universities use SAT scores as a factor in admission decisions. Some describe it as a way to predict whether a student will have a successful freshman year.

Unlike PACTs, which are mandatory, high school students take the SAT voluntarily, and pay $29.50 to do so.

The annual report on SAT scores comes each August from the College Board, a private company that owns the test. It has strict rules about when the information can be made public.

After learning news organizations were working on reports about test results before the official release date, Tenenbaum said she conferred with the College Board to alert it that she was going to divulge the statewide average.

Details of district-by-district and individual high school scores will be announced Tuesday.

Tenenbaum speculated the decline could be linked to the fact 133 more seniors a year ago took the test than their counterparts in 2003.

Tenenbaum said the state faces no consequences from the College Board over her decision to reveal the state’s average score.

“It’s an ethical issue,” she said.

Asked if she thought stories circulating about the test-score decline were politically motivated, Tenenbaum said, “it’s not the first time a leak occurred in South Carolina,” adding “it’s unfair and unethical.”

Sanford spokesman Will Folks said no one from the governor’s office released the information and noted representatives of several agencies attended the briefings. Folks said Sanford plans to talk with Barbara Nielsen, one of his advisers, about the reason Nielsen invited an employee of the S.C. Policy Council to attend the briefing.

The organization is a conservative research organization Republican lawmakers look to for guidance in crafting laws and public policies.

Efforts to reach Nielsen and Ashley Landess, the Policy Council’s spokesperson, were not successful.

Reach Robinson at (803) 771-8482 or brobinson@thestate.com.