<p>I think the most important thing brought up here is the constant thought that the difference calls into question what that 4.05 means.</p>
<p>Whatever the actual reason for the difference is, the fact that this is the reaction of so many people on the board means it's a good bet that's what an admissions committee will think as well. Do whatever you can to bring up those scores!</p>
<br>
<blockquote> <p>I think the most important thing brought up here is the constant thought that the difference calls into question what that 4.05 means.>></p> </blockquote>
<br>
<p>I have a kid like this (ok...her GPA was "only" 3.75). Her difference between GPA and SAT scores (1230 CR/Math) was that she was a very hard worker. Not a stupid kid by any measure or means. However, she studied hard, worked hard, and really did well in situations where she was able to revise, wasn't timed, and had time to check and recheck her answers. BTW...she has chosen engineering as a college major...she has a 3.1 GPA there...which we think is remarkably good for a freshman with an challenging science and math courseload.</p>
<p>I'm going to echo momofthreeboys. I would only have my child take the SAT/ACT one more time. If the scores are similar, then look for schools that do holistic admissions instead of schools that need to use SAT/ACT as a cut off. </p>
<p>If the standardized test scores are somewhat indicative of predicted college performance as aforementioned, what good is it to study and cram and raise the score after a series of tests so you can now be the bottom of what is admitted to your "dream" school? I would not want my child to feel overwhelmed for four years. </p>
<p>If other testing measures (AP scores, SAT IIs, etc...) are higher and do not support the current SAT/ACT score, then I would feel differently. If all nationally normed measures are in the same ballpark, then I would definitely look to schools that admit holistically and do not use testing as a cut off because of large application numbers.</p>
<p>Thumper, my son is like your daughter, always worked hard and I knew he'd do well whether someone thought his scores were so-so or better. Sometimes you can't find a perfect fit, but it's individual and you shouldn't let others influence you. Schools that recognize different ways of learning are a blessing.
I recall something a very bright student at my son's high school said to me...he told me my son in many ways was brighter than he was and his large merit scholarship to many schools was partly because he had a photographic memory, he just would remember facts/figures. Understanding it is something else. I think he was being honest but also beng very modest too.
It also reminded me of what my doctor would tell me when he was trying to find a partner for his OB/GYN practice. He finally gave up because he had a lot of young bright doctors apply, but they just regurgitated facts, no one could THINK, he said.
My son told me in college, SAT scores didn't really matter, there were students that scored much higher than he did but didn't get his A's. Maybe they were more complacent, partied too much, but I think when you always had to work harder for whatever reason, the skills there are well used. My son has his immature moments, but the day he told me that a timed test would never define who he was, he knew that person, and his score wasn't it, made me very proud.</p>
<p>
[quote]
I think the most important thing brought up here is the constant thought that the difference calls into question what that 4.05 means
[/quote]
</p>
<p>College admissions officers will have a better understanding of what 4.05 means than we will. They'll get the grade distribution from the school, class rank, etc. Plus the admissions officers are likely familiar with the school and have a good feel for the rigor of its grading. </p>
<p>If your daughter is interested in raising her scores, I agree with the posters who suggest practice tests or reviewing her previous test to assess strengths and weaknesses first and then developing a personalized plan. </p>
<p>I know someone who raised her math score 5 ACT points or so over the summer between junior and senior year without a tremendous amount of work by targetting the specific areas where she had trouble. A few misconceptions about geometry can cause a lot of wrong answers, for example, and that is not likely to be identified and corrected in a group workshop.</p>
<p>Your D. can easily see if time management is a barrier by giving herself an extra 15-30 minutes on a practice test to see if it raises her score.</p>
<p>Wow, your D must be very hardworking.</p>
<p>I would forget about the scores. Back in the dark ages (the mid-'70s), I scored just below 1200 on the SAT and just above 1200 on the GREs. I realized the scores weren't great, but I didn't worry about them either or label myself a poor test taker as a result. I never gave it any thought at all at the time. It has only been in reading cc and seeing what colleges expect now on those tests that I wonder why I didn't test better. But, wondering at age 50 isn't nearly as devastating to self-esteem as wondering at age 17. I'm glad nobody told me my scores were some sort of aberration and indicated a disconnect relative to my grades. </p>
<p>I had skipped a grade in elementary school, was third in my class in high school, and graduated undergrad and grad school with a 4.0 GPA. I don't remember having to work too hard in high school or college, except in math classes, because I didn't consider reading and writing to be work and I have a good enough memory to fake it in math.</p>
<p>My poor test taking ability, if that is in fact the problem, has never reared its head as any kind of hindrance in my career. In my view, the emphasis on these tests can do needless damage to a young person's self-esteem.</p>
<p>One thing your daughter should realize: The "penalty" for guessing is a misnomer, and if she can eliminate even ONE wrong answer, SHE SHOULD GUESS. If she leaves 5 questions blank, she earns 0 points. If she randomly guesses on those 5 questions, she will (on average) get 1 right and the other 4 wrong and earn a net 0 points on them. If she eliminates ONE wrong answer, she'll come out ahead on average. If she can eliminate 2 or 3 of the 4 wrong answers, she'll do even better. Anyone who advises students to avoid guessing or to only guess when they have eliminate 2 answer choices is an idiot when it comes to the SAT.</p>
<p>When your daughter takes the SAT, she needs has to be in the right frame of mind. She has to be like Charlie's Angels or James Bond - in other words, she needs to work quickly while avoiding the traps. The SAT is NOT the time or place to emulate Maya Angelou, Marie Curie, or Albert Einstein.</p>
<p>Your daughter needs to realize is that the SAT is a different world from the academic world and requires a completely different way of thinking. Your daughter has all the verbal skills she needs for the SAT. If she's made it through trigonometry, she's had all the math she needs for the SAT.</p>
<p>Unlike class tests, the SAT questions are carefully tested through the infamous "experimental" section. The questions have to fit a statistical model. One important criterion is something called "biserial correlation", and savvy test-takers can take advantage of this. If a question has a high biserial correlation, that means that the high-scoring students get it right and low-scoring students get it wrong. An example of a question that would have a low biserial correlation is one that asks for the square root of 4. High-scoring students know what a square root is and get it right. Lower-scoring students don't know what a square root is and get it wrong. But the lowest-scoring students think that a square root is that number divided by 2 and thus get it right by accident. The results of the experimental section would show the biserial correlation, and the question would be thrown out and perhaps replaced by one asking for the square root of 9.</p>
<p>One thing for your daughter to remember is that wrong answers are NOT pulled out of thin air but rather chosen to look attractive. The test makers figure out what mistakes students are most likely to make and incorporate them into answer choices.</p>
<p>Your daughter also needs to take into account the difficulty of the question. Except for the reading passages, the questions in a given section are arranged in order of difficulty (such as easy-medium-difficult, easy-medium, or medium-difficult). This arrangement plus the need for high biserial correlation is what makes Joe Bloggs (hypothetical student who is perfect at being average) such an indispensable partner. On easy questions, your daughter should trust her hunches, because Joe Bloggs gets these questions right. On medium questions, she should question her hunches, because Joe Bloggs is sometimes right and sometimes wrong. (This doesn't mean she needs deep thinking - she just needs to beware of booby traps.) On difficult questions, she should eliminate ANY answer that seems to jump off the page, that seems to "go with" the words in the question, that repeats a number in the question, or that is the result of simple operations done to numbers in the question (so if 2 and 3 appear in the question, eliminate 5 and 6 in the answer choices). Because Joe Bloggs is ALWAYS wrong on difficult questions (if he were right, it would be easy or medium), she should always ELIMINATE the Joe Bloggs answer(s).</p>
<p>For the sentence completions, your daughter needs to fill in the blanks BEFORE looking at the answer choices so she can bypass the booby traps. She also needs to know SAT vocabulary. The tougher vocabulary words are NOT used in everyday language. How many times have you heard the word "calumniate"? Or "abashed"? Or "comely"?</p>
<p>For the reading incomprehension questions, your daughter must NOT try to understand everything in the reading passages. She just needs to get a few key points (like the main idea and the information in the sentences with "trigger words"), and she should answer the questions BEFORE looking at the answer choices so she can bypass the booby traps.</p>
<p>The math questions should be even easier to game. There's the create-a-ruler trick, the plugging in trick (plug in the answer choices into the problem), the approximation trick, and the plug-in-strange-numbers trick (for the Quantitative Comparisons).</p>
<p>SOME PERSPECTIVE ON THE SAT:</p>
<p>I talked about the need for the test taker to act more like an action hero (but armed with a pencil), know the tough vocabulary words, and use slick tricks. Yes, I know that this has nothing to do with what students study in school. That's the point. The SAT, GRE, and similar standardized tests have NOTHING to do with doing well in school. I was a National Merit Finalist and scored 690V/780M/60+TSWE on the SAT in 1991. I scored 620V/650A/800M on the GRE in 2002. I liked the brownie points I earned for my high scores, but believe me, I would have gladly traded them away for the important things I needed in school.</p>
<p>If SAT scores were a good predictor of undergraduate performance, I would have graduated with High Honors and been one of the top students. Instead, I was a poorly motivated undergraduate student. I'm surprised I earned my BSEE at UIUC with a GPA of 4.13 on a 5-point scale (3.13 on the 4-point scale), because my attitude was very shoddy at the time. (This was BEFORE I was an amateur radio operator. I couldn't relate to the electrical engineering I was studying.) In retrospect, I'm surprised I didn't flunk out. Trust me, I would have gladly traded away my SAT scores for more motivation. Today, I would gladly trade away my SAT scores for good knowledge of semiconductor circuits. Although my previous engineering jobs didn't use anything I studied in electrical engineering, my current one does. The semiconductor circuits class I took was the bane of my existence, and I never really learned the material I was studying. I had to work hard to BS my way through the class. (In retrospect, I'm surprised I earned a B in it instead of an F. Of course, I know now that most students nationwide who take that class don't get it either.) Oh, and my required senior project was a total joke. I was one of <10% of students to earn a C (everyone else earned an A or B), and I think the TA passed me so he'd never have to see me again.</p>
<p>If GRE scores were a good predictor of graduate school performance, I would have graduated near the top of my class instead of the bottom. I earned a GPA of only 3.03 and just barely graduated. I am happy to tell you that it wasn't my attitude that weighed me down. Instead, I was studying a part of electrical engineering where I had a weak previous background. A bigger factor was the time I spent doing an independent study and a research project, both of which took time away from studying for my classes. I could have earned a better GPA if I had taken the all-class route to my MSEE at George Mason University, but I needed practical experience and had been criticized in the past for being too book-smart. That said, I would have gladly traded away my GRE scores for a stronger prior background in signal processing and control systems as well as more prior experience building circuits.</p>
<p>If the OP's daughter has this high a GPA at a competitive, not grade-inflated prep school where presumably not a lot of other students have achieved as well as she has, then she must be good at taking some kinds of tests -- just not the SAT/ACT multiple choice kind. I am wondering if she might have some sort of a formal learning difference for which she cannot compensate on speed-is-(almost)-everything multiple choice tests. If this is the case, it would make sense to talk with an educational psychologist and have D evaluated. Obviously, college is going to be a lot more like intense prep school than like sitting for the SAT's, so D's test scores probably are not good predictors of her college success, but they might be good predictors of her LSAT/MCAT/GRE success unless the parents determine what is going on. Assuming most kids at D's school with her GPA have SAT's that are significantly higher, understanding the discrepancy seems important.</p>
<p>But the good news jhsu2 is you can always get better motivated somewhere along the line in life. You can't change your basic intelligence.</p>
<p>Curiously, on CC, there is no "average". Every kid deserves A's and 2400's, because everyone is equally intelligent...it's just that some kids "test badly" and some kids "are unmotivated". Why can't those colleges see that?</p>
<p>That's like me. I have a 4.0w GPA but only a 1660 SAT.</p>
<p>I may have missed this, but since the 4.05 must be a weighted GPA, it is hard to look at it and the test scores and really know how big the discrepancy is. At my kids' hs, a B in an Honors course is weighted 4.0 (and A+ is 5.5--i know, I know...) So it may be a student working pretty hard in Honors courses and getting B's (perfectly honorable, but less discrepancy from the SAT.) I'm not saying this is the case, I have no way of knowing, but I suggest the possibility.</p>
<p>Allmusic, no one is saying that everyone is above average and deserves perfect grades and test scores. What we are saying is that sometimes there is a huge disconnect between actual performance in the <em>real world</em> context of schoolwork vs. the artificial, standardized testing environment. That's what we parents of high-achieving kids with mediocre test scores mean when we say "test badly". It is ridiculous to tell a kid with straight A's in a demanding academic environment that they are not smart enough because their test scores come out much lower, and then tell them that some kid who is doing much worse in terms of school work is "smarter" because they do better on a standardized test. </p>
<p>I also am a little concerned about all the references to the low testing/high achieving kids as "hard workers" as if they only manage to get ahead because they are working very, very hard to get there. That is not quite the experience I have with my daughter, who graduated near the top of her high school class and is on Dean's list at Barnard. Yes, she does work hard... but not all that hard. I would use these adjectives to describe my daughter: disciplined - diligent - efficient - proactive - consistent - engaged - enthusiastic. I would not describe her as a drudge or a grind -- she is very good about doing her homework regularly and keeping on top of it, but she doesn't work particularly long hours. She deals with college by attending class regularly, staying on top of the reading, and prepping for exams with an hour or two of study or review -- which I would think would be reasonable for any kid. </p>
<p>In other words, my daughter is not some slow-witted drudge who only manages to get A's because she is working herself to the point of exhaustion. She simply is a kid who needs to spend a reasonable amount of time preparing for an exam -- and does it. I really don't know why she seems unable to produce a score on standardized, multiple-choice format tests that matches her classroom and real-world performance... but the fact is that I've known the kid for 19 years and seen that she is extremely smart & capable and tends to do very well at most things, but not standardized tests. So at least in this case, the tests are wrong, and we know the tests are wrong because in real life she regularly performs much better than the tests would indicate. Since the purpose of the test is supposedly to predict performance, then obviously when the test under-predicts performance, the test is wrong.</p>
<p>And of course, not all high testers are lazy and underperforming in school...high testers can have a work ethic, too!</p>
<p>However, the poor tester claim comes up fairly often, and I have to say that I wonder if it is really true even half the time that people claim it is. Additionally, if the OP and his daughter have their sights set on top tier Universities or LACs, many of them (at least the top 25 on each list) will not have much room for a student from an elite college prep program who scores at this level and has no other factors particularly in their favor (no hooks, basically). That certainly isn't to say that there are no good schools that would accept someone with a 24 ACT or even that there aren't any top tier schools that would accept someone with a 24 ACT, but I do believe that it is a bit rich to pretend like this low score wouldn't pose any problems to a student looking for a presumedly selective school. (Assuming the student did not stick to schools that were test score optional).</p>
<p>I think it's possible to be a poor tester if you get overwhelmed easily. Really easily. Because it seems like a one shot thing. Also the material is not "familiar" per se and some people just feel perfectly comfortable with taking a test in something they've studied. Some people aren't aggressive guessers, but for example in my school (IB) we do not have multiple choice tests as a rule so this is not really a similar testing condition. I do not think most college exams are like the SAT. </p>
<p>George Mason University in Northern Va is a very up and coming school with some great programs that is test optional. There are a few good LACs that are test optional, like Sarah Lawrence. Have you thought about what kinds of schools you might look at?</p>
<p>^^St John has no test, I think that is what I remember the brochure states.</p>
<p>My daughter was admitted this year to the Unversity of North Carolina at Chapel Hill on 1570 -CR + MATH + Essay, so it is not all considered by the SAT score. She is 7th in her class of 362. Her weighted GPA is 4.75 and unweighted is 3.88. She was a cheerleader on two different teams throughout high school, also a Wendy's high school heisman nominee. She was involved with many clubs, but president of one club, which she was very involved. She has volunteer hours and various other things. My mind has gone blank - I've been gone all weekend. I was going to tell you that a boy at her school scored a 2060 on the SAT and was deferred until late May-when he was offered admission. Another boy at her school who is Vietnamese and scored around 2100 was deferred and did not get in at all, so it is not all about the scores. It helps to score high, but they consider everything. My daughter works her butt off, so I know she will do well in college. She is use to putting in the hours it takes to do her homework. Some people have it made in high school, because they do not have to study hard and still make A's. I would say that would not be the case in college without putting some studying time in. I am just trying to say that colleges look at the whole package not just the SAT score. My daughter has never done well on the standarized tests. It is something about the test being timed that causes her to be stressed out. I believe if they came in on the SAT testing day and said that they were not timing the test that day-just take your time. I know she would do much better and most of the stress would be gone.</p>
<p>
[quote]
However, the poor tester claim comes up fairly often, and I have to say that I wonder if it is really true even half the time that people claim it is.
[/quote]
Has it occurred to you that it simply might reflect a very real problem with the test? </p>
<p>No one has said that the test score won't pose a problem to the student in getting admitted to an elite college -- but that doesn't mean that it should be that way. If the kid is doing well at a truly rigorous prep school, then it is likely she will do well in college. It might be different if there were doubts about the quality of her high school... though I have to say that my daughter comes from a high school that is NOT rigorous or particularly challenging. I'm glad so many high end colleges looked at her grades, her essay, the teacher recs rather than the test scores -- because obviously she is more than qualified to do the work at an elite college even though most CC posters probably would have laughed at us if we had posted her stats in a chances thread. Truthfully, the biggest surprise for my daughter at college was that she did not find herself in the intellectual power house that she imagined an elite college/Ivy campus would be. In other words, she's met quite a few people with very high test scores who simply aren't all that bright -- and that was a surprise to her. </p>
<p>The problem is that standardized tests measure a very superficial type of knowledge and skill set. I understand why colleges that are flooded with thousands of applications each year use those tests as a short-cut way to assess the strength of their applicants --- but it dismays me to see people on boards like this equating scores with intellectual ability -- or to be so accepting of the validity of the test. </p>
<p>It makes a lot of sense to assume that a B student with a 24 ACT is what the test score suggests she is. It does not make sense to assume the same of an A student from a competitive high school. We CC readers don't have information as to the general profile of students at that high school and range of grades.... but the college ad coms will. Hopefully that student can attend a college with a holistic admission process that will not engage in the fiction of denying her demonstrated accomplishments based on a test score.</p>