<p>A lot of posters are saying that it's OK to not worry about this and just look at schools that don't look at the SAT or won't mind lower scores. That was my first thought, as well, but keep in mind that she'll need to take standardized tests for graduate school or AP tests. I think discoering what the problem is now is a better idea than figuring out that the problem still exists when she's trying to take the LSAT.</p>
<p>I agree with other posters to take a weekend, give her a timed practice test in a test setting, and then examining the scores and talking about what she was thinking at different points. If you can afford it, getting a good professional to do work like this would likely be money well spent if you can't figure it out yourself easily and effectively.</p>
<p>Her ACT scores look like they have more growth potential than her SAT scores. ACT is based on the actual knowledge gained in school, and has no tricks; you can actually study for it on your own and improve your score. </p>
<p>Our school district makes all 8-11th graders take ACT's (grade-specific versions) annually to track their progress. My D is not a strong tester, so she decided to take only one test - the ACT administered at school. We bought 2 prep books and every weekend for 3 months before the test, she practiced one section (they are about an hour each), rotating through all the subjects, except for writing. 3 weeks before the test, she practiced two writing sections. It worked out pretty well for her.</p>
<p>Her cousins in the Midwest (where everyone takes the ACT) also studied on their own the same way and raised their scores by 3-4 points each time.</p>
<p>Let's see...if a boy had a 2300 and a 3.2 we would call him a slacker.
So, what is the terminology for a girl who has a 1600 and a 4.05? Poor test taker is the usual theme. I think these scores are really pretty low for someone attending an elite school who reads a moderate amount and is getting decent writing instruction. Is there a big spread in her scores?</p>
<p>It's not just to do well on the SAT's or LSAT's that it is worth trying to understand why this is happening with her. The pace at which kids have to work in college in general is much faster and it might be worth understanding why. If you could have an evaluation done it might prove a worthwhile investment well beyond a single test.</p>
<p>How about this?? My son took two SATIIs with no prep and got 770 and 690. He took his AP History test as a 10th grader, and he got a 5. PSAT scores were 72 for CR and 65 for Math.</p>
<p>He took a prep course in school. His SAT scores that just came in: 650 Math and 640 for CR - he WENT DOWN 80 points for the CR. I truly believe that my son is a great test taker naturally (he did great on the SSATs in 8th grade, too) and taking the course taught him strategies that he did NOT need, so he was thinking strategies or overthinking rather than just take the test.</p>
<p>He is taking the ACTs next weekend, so we shall see.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Let's see...if a boy had a 2300 and a 3.2 we would call him a slacker.
So, what is the terminology for a girl who has a 1600 and a 4.05? Poor test taker is the usual theme.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>One humble opinion that I am beginning to develop in the workplace as I get older is that human beings have different gifts and talents, and that the job of a good manager is not so much to identify and correct each individual's weaknesses as it is to figure out and take advantage of that person's strengths. Although HS students aren't finished products, I'm wondering how much to apply the same philosophy to them.</p>
<p>Two examples of different gifts and talents (not your kid or mine!)
(OK, one of them might actually be mine....)</p>
<p>Hypothetical Boy: 2300/3.2. He is an intuitive quick-thinking problem solver whose grasps concepts easily but leaves his homework on the kitchen counter. He knows he is learning a lot in his classes, but he doesn't see the point in busting his butt for a grade to prove it. He can get motivated by hard challenges, though, and is up to level 13 in a computer game of strategy that requires remembering minute details and making complicated associations. </p>
<p>Hypothetical Girl: 1600/4.0. She has a brain that works differently--she thinks problems through slowly and methodically, which is why she is often up late studying. She knows that she doesn't think as fast as some of the other kids, but she makes up for it. She is reliable, conscientious, and works hard because she knows it is important to get good grades to get into a good college. She is active in Girl Scouts, and is very proud at having earned Gold Award and a number of other forms of recognition.</p>
<p>The challenge for parents and GCs is not only to try to pull up Girl's SAT and Boy's GPA, but to help them find situations in which they can thrive given their own unique makeup. Either of the above kids could find themselves in trouble at the wrong school. Boy could be bored and get into trouble in an unchallenging school. Girl could end up with serious depression if her hard work isn't enough to cut it at an overly-challening school. Both can thrive in the right setting. A few years down the road, Slacker Boy may be brainstorming new ideas at an internet startup company, and Grinder Girl may have the corner office at a law firm. (I guarantee it won't be the other way around.)</p>
<p>The is one of the reasons why this "fit" thing we keep talking about is so important in college selection. Matching the kid as an individual with the right college environment so he/she can thrive. It's particularly hard to do this in an unbiased way when it's your own wonderful kid. </p>
<p>I wish I were better at figuring out this touchy-feely stuff. Oh, well, that's just not one of my strengths.... ;)</p>
<p>I read this heading and thought "Is someone writing about my daughter"</p>
<p>My d has taken the ACT 2x and gotten a 24 both times. She just got her SAT scores and barely cracked 1700. She has a uw gpa of 3.8 and w of 4.44 at a very competitive public.</p>
<p>She truly is a bad test taker. Always has been. She will be spending the summer trying to get her ACT up to a 26. It is frustrating for her--but we are looking into test optional schools.</p>
<p>Understanding that this is a continuum and may as well show subject matter variability, Dad'o'2 provides an interesting description of the many "roads to Rome" students find. S1 tended to fall more into the former, a hyper challenging academic environment caused him to blossom as Dad'o'2 predicts. It is up to the admission folks to try and figure this all out, not an easy job. Interestingly, the schools with reputations for a high degree of academic rigor accepted him, perhaps they are not too bad at their job either.</p>
<p>I think Dado2 has done a good job of illustrating what my original thoughts were, too. When I first read your post my immediate thoughts were that 1) the school might have some grade inflation happening. If I were a betting person, I would guess that happens with more frequency than might be suspected with private schools- parents pay $, schools want happy parents 2) the scores received are above the national averages of college bound kids, they aren't fall down great, but they aren't horrible either and stronger coupled with the current GPA rather than coupled with Bs from a public school. My thought also was that it's possible that your child is great at memorizing material or gleaning exactly what the teacher wants to pass a particular test but is less adept at applying what was learned in a different context or situation and 3) what advice are you exactly looking for? I thought people have given good advice. If it's grade inflation better to find out now, there are plenty of great schools that would like your child with the GPA and above average test scores, and you've gotten great ideas for things that your child might do to try to bolster the test scores, but odds are that the ACT won't go from a 24 to a 36 or the SAT go zooming up.</p>
<p>Being a "poor test taker" can become a big problem in college, where final grades are almost entirely test-based, homework counts for very little, and there are no "extra credit" opportunities. High schools are often rewarding the kids who are willing to work hard to get an A, even if they don't do well on the tests. It is not exactly "grade inflation" --they work for their grade, but it is not something they can keep on doing in college. </p>
<p>I know that my HS daughter could get Fs on almost all of her finals, and end up with As for the semester. This could not happen in college, and for some kids it is very stressful to have to do well on the tests.</p>
<p>to other posters, yes, the numbers you provided are not bad by any means, but are substantially less than one might expect.
Let's remember what the tests usually reflect. Typically, a high school test is over a specific bit of info(chapters 1-5, test tomorrow). A past teacher explained to me years ago that is a great way to test a student's short term memory. She went on to say memorizing is much different than learning. The ACT is very different, as it tests a big mixture of things the student has learned over the years, and what he can infer, thinking skills, plus his skill at test taking. It's not apples and oranges, but I might think of it as oranges and limes- much more similar, but still not quite the same thing.
I would urge you to continue taking every Sat and Act available, do not have scores automatically forwarded, get practice tests and other test taking practices, then when your time is up, send best test score to preferred colleges. (Remember schools that prefer ACT, still accept SAT- they just use a conversion formula.) Send them only the best result.</p>
<p>I remember discussions of this problem in years past. We discussed once about the gender bias of SAT tests.</p>
<p>"Analyses of SAT gender bias cite several causes including the test's emphasis on speed over sustained reasoning and its multiple-choice format." (Fairtest) By that I guess the thought is that girls, more likely than boys, will fret whether the answer is A or B, B or A, A or B (just like at the optometrist's office) whereas a boy will put an answer down and move on.</p>
<p>I think that such a person could do perfectly fine on college tests where "sustained reasoning" is key and knowledge of an actual body of knowledge is important.</p>
<p>I've also heard some noise about the SAT's gender bias going the other way, since there are two verbal/writing sections and only one math section, with the claim being that girls are stronger on the verbal sections and are thus advantaged by having the test weighted as such. Not something that I am personally interested in studying and figuring out, but I have read that before.</p>
<p>Have you considered the possibility she's a cheater? No offense, but if it really is an excellent prep school (and you know it's not inflated), she might just be sitting next to the right people in the right courses.</p>
<p>Ouch! Personally, I wonder about how great this elite college prep school is, since it is my personal opinion that a lot of that crowing (both from public and private HS) about how "elite" their school is is more marketing than anything. </p>
<p>Of course, it really could be that the OP's D is just truly a poor test-taker, but unfortunately I have to agree with the other posters that that is something that needs to be overcome to move forward at the high level that her schoolwork (seems to) suggest.</p>
<p>DD also had lopsided stats. She was a top 5% student in her class with a rigorous courseload. Her highest combined SAT (CR and Math only) was 1230...and that was after a prep course and a lot of studying on her part (partial xiggi method...I'm not sure she was as diligent as Xiggi). She is happily enrolled in college. She applied to five schools (one was an ultimate safety and local, at our insistance), two were matches, one a safety (far away) and one a big reach. She didn't get accepted at the reach...I'm sure they looked at her SAT scores and didn't even look at the rest of your application. But she got accepted everywhere else...and she is mighty happy where she is. This hard working child of the OP's will find a great school where she will thrive regardless of her SAT/ACT scores.</p>
<p>For some high schools, teachers do not give a lot of extra credits so a student GPA depends a lot on tests. This maybe why Standardized testing comes into play to compare GPAs from different schools. What's 4.6 GPAs from one school could be 4.0 GPAs in another school ? I don't believe this is due to cheating and I don't believe a kid who does not get perfect GPA is lazy either, I know mine isn't, always turn in her homework but the homework points don't count much to make a diffence. If a student blew her final exam she is not going to get a good grade in her class, her school has similar grading scheme similar to colleges/universities.</p>
My daughter is a "poor tester" (though she did somewhat better than the OP's daughter), and is doing fine in college. Her test scores are in the lower 25% for her college. Her college grades spring semester? All A's and one A+. (She is at Barnard and the A+ was earned at Columbia. ).</p>
<p>Also, during high school she took 6 AP exams, including 3 where she had not completed the underlying "AP" version of the course, and scored 5 on one and 4's on all the rest. He poor test-taking really was confined to the SAT's & ACT, though she also tended to do well below the expected level on the standardized assessment tests the public schools give each spring. </p>
<p>The problem is that not all tests are the same. I think Dad'o'2 hit the nail on the head about the kind of minds that do well on standardized tests -- my high scoring (but sometimes slacker) son also loves computer games and all sorts of puzzles -- he loves logic problems, Kakro, crossword puzzles, and constantly is sending me links to new games he has found on the internet. My daughter hates that sort of stuff -- I wouldn't quite call her "Grinder Girl" as she is very quick to pick up on concepts and tends to be somewhat impatient if the pace of a class is too slow, but at the same time she really does best academically when she is expected to learn and apply material that she is given rather than when expected to figure it out for herself. She does see the big picture and make good connections, but she simply would rather be given a large body of material to read and learn than to be thrust into a situation where the assessment was done based on problem-solving skills.</p>
<p>Not that she doesn't have good problem-solving skills, but I think she's good at the sort of deep immersion type of problems -- she does really like to think things through, discuss & debate, consider all information thoroughly, etc. </p>
<p>So making a big pronouncement between the test results and college prospects is, I think, both specious and uncalled for. I think Dad'o'2's comments ought to be printed out and framed -- it IS very important for the OP to find the kind of college that fits the daughter's learning style, and that college is probably not MIT. But many LACs and small colleges do NOT rely on quizzes and multiple choice tests when making assessments -- it is far more likely that the student will encounter essay-format exams and take many college classes where the grade relies on papers, essays or take-home exams rather than in-class, timed exams. </p>
<p>I'd encourage the OP to get a better handle on the <em>why</em> of it, but look at it more from Dad'o'2's perspective of finding the good fit college than worrying about trying to boost the scores with intense test prep. There are many forms of assessment, and the SATs/ACTs rank pretty low in terms of the quality of what they assess. They are used primarily because they provide a quick and dirty way for colleges to weed through their applicants.... not because they have a whole lot of predictive validity.</p>
<p>Toorich is correct, which is why fortunately our college/university system tends to attempt to look at kids holistically. This is a good thing, there is no tit for tat much to dismay of some posters. My kids are in a small public system that primarily seems to operate on a curve -- when you have lots of very bright kids all college material...well if you are not at the tippy top you're in the B+/A- group....lower GPA, higher standardized test scores. It doesn't really hurt them in the college acceptance realm or the scholarship realm because most colleges also look at this combination of factors. The school val had a 3.8. Val/Sal are chosen using GPA/standardized test scores and rigor of curriculum (incl. AP classes) as the measurement. Everyone has told you that all will be fine...and it will. If after the next round of SAT/ACT the scores are not substantially increasing, look for colleges where that is less important or are SAT optional. Most everyone has had great advice. I have no advice necessarily to share just good wishes for whatever outcome occurs. How does your child feel? Are they OK with the standardized test scores? Was the assumption that the scores would be better? Where is the interest at? Were the test scores balanced between the math and the reading or was there desparity...too many factors for us to really critique the situation...only supposition.</p>