<p>I read many times on CC that people came across high ranking high school students with low SAT scores. There are stories of low SAT scores for the entire tier of 3.9-4.0 students in a high school. I always wondered about whether such anecdotes were exaggerated, and even if true, how prevalent is this phenomenon.</p>
<p>Well, now I wonder no more. I got this information directly from National Merit Scholarship Corporation. Only 4603 out of more than 22,000 high schools in the country have at least one National Merit Semifinalist. Since PSAT scores track SAT scores very well, I have no doubt there are many high schools out there with either severe grades inflation or very poor quality of education. </p>
<p>I always assumed something like this was true. My kidÂ’s school had 36 NMSF out of around 600 students. ThatÂ’s 6%. And it isnÂ’t even a powerhouse magnet or anything. Since less than 1% of kids (I think) are NMSF there have to be a lot of schools with none.</p>
<p>In my urban district of more than 15 schools all NMSF are concentrated in four HS, so I guess that’s about the natl avg. A school with some of the richest kids in the district had none. I found that shocking.</p>
<p>I think that every year there are about 18,000 National Merit Semifinalists. Even if they were spread evenly through the 22,000 high schools, there’d be 4000 high schools without a semifinalist. The excess high schools without semifinalists include small rural schools (where the odds of having a semifinalist are low) and schools where students generally don’t take the PSAT (some overlap with those “small rural schools” and at these schools, the GCs are at fault for not encouraging the juniors to take the PSAT more than the schools are at fault for “severe grades inflation or very poor quality of education.”) The number is a little lower than I would have guessed, but I’m not shocked. Proportion of NMS tracks with family income and with parent education level.</p>
<p>Sometimes when a parent has asked if his/her “straight A” child would likely get a college scholarship, I’ve politely asked if his/her standardized test scores reflect the top percentiles ( 95+ percentiles). Usually the answer is “no”…often the reality is that their “top student” is scoring in the 60-70 percentile - not usually high enough for any merit $$$. </p>
<p>This usually “opens the parents’s eyes” and makes them realize that their child’s school is not as “difficult” as they once imagined.</p>
<p>mom2ck’s post made me think of a tangent. I hope PCP doesn’t mind.</p>
<p>Do you think a school can “grow” NMSFs? Take a bright kid leaving middle school and put him/her in an avg HS environment. Take same kid and put him/her in an accelerated environment, with more AP (or IB) classes, a more motivated peer group, lots of academic-related EC opportunities, etc. Do you think that the HS has a small or large or no effect on whether that kid could become a NMSF? Or even see an improvement in test scores so that a child might be Commended when he/she might not have been at the “avg” other school?</p>
<p>I know plenty of kids whose SAT scores would have translated into National Merit semi-finalist or commended student status, but whose PSATs weren’t close. They walked into the PSAT cold, with no practice – either on their own or at school. Many schools do absolutely no prep work for standardized exams. </p>
<p>Once they see their PSATs, they get to work studying for the SAT. And their SAT scores increase significantly, reflecting that.</p>
<p>22,000 high schools had students who took the PSAT tests last October. As NorthMinnesota pointed out, some high schools did not even participate and therefore are not even counted in the 22,000 total. I don’t know how many high schools are like this, but it certainly means more than 80% of the high schools dont’ have any NMSF’s.</p>
<p>I think this is not terribly surprising, given that each state has a different cut-off for NMSF and there’s a predetermined limit to the number of students who become NMSFs. Only the very top scorers in each state become NMSFs. Here’s the (current, still-being-worked-on) list of required scores from the SAT forum:</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>So if Wyoming’s cut-off of 201 applied nationwide, there would be many many more schools with NMSFs. </p>
<p>Taking the PSAT/SAT and doing well requires a certain skill set that is useful for taking a particular kind of standardized test (such as the PSAT/SAT ). That skill set is not the be-all and end-all of education, and just because a kid doesn’t excel in that area doesn’t mean a kid can’t excel in all the other (usually way way more important) educational skill sets.</p>
<p>I say this as the mother of a kid who does extremely well on these types of standardized tests. He has a particular ability for them. That does not mean that a kid who doesn’t have that ability is a poor student, or is not bright – my kid knows many many very bright kids (the kind who take calculus in 8th or 9th grade types) who simply didn’t perform exceedingly well (by our state’s standards) on the PSAT, yet get, and well deserve, their straight As and 4.gazillion weighted GPAs. </p>
<p>We live in Maryland, which has a very high cut-off. If these very bright kids lived in Wyoming, West Virginia, or quite a few other states, they’d be NMSFs.</p>
<p>I’m not surprised. At my son’s school there were 10 NMSF (he was one :)) this year of a class of 60. Out of the 15 public HS in our county, there were only 23 NMSF in 8 schools (the IB magnet school had 8 of those 23 NMSF) and there were 7 schools with 0 NMSF.</p>
<p>I do think the school curriculum makes a difference.</p>
<p>As for the SAT - our school average is 200 points above the county average. Which is why, IMHO, you can’t compare GPAs and class ranks from one school to the next. The only accurate comparative measure would be SAT/ACT and AP exam scores.</p>
<p>Given the small % of the population that make NMSF, it is not surprising to me at all, since many of these top kids are clustered at the selective high schools.</p>
<p>At my son’s highschool last year only 100 juniors were allowed to register there for the PSAT-- The school ordered 100 test books and kids that were slow to sign up were out of luck. I was shocked by this! I didn’t notice it until my son was a senior and had a junior friend who was not an IB student over who was complaining about this. The only prep the school did was to go to the IB classes (total of about 35 students in the school) and nag all of them into signing up for the test. The school produced 2 finalists and 1 commended out of my son’s class of 265 total students (of course, most of them did not take the test).</p>
<p>A lot of kids just don’t want to go through the process of completing the requirements. My son declined because he didn’t want to do the 80 hours of community service in 20 different areas. Of course I didn’t even know he had the option to apply since the announcement was only made in school. This year he is a Junior and I will be bird dogging the GC office for the info.</p>
<p>Sorry, I didn’t mean our school didn’t have anyone take the tests. Just that it’s not required and many choose not to take it. It is a very large school district with multiple HS. Just checked the stats and the district had 19 Finalists and 40 commended last yr.</p>
<p>Why would they limit the # and how did they select those 100? That doesn’t make sense to me - schools in our area require everyone to take it. I guess I don’t see the advantage to limiting the number of students (other than cost).</p>
<p>I am not surprised by this stats. In our state, the NMSF candidates are overwhelmingly from selective high schools, especially the suburban high schools. Example, my son #1’s high school has 27 NMSF candidates out of 1000 graduating seniors while son #2’s high school, which is a science and math academy, has 42 NMSF candidates out of 180 graduating seniors.</p>
<p>Do you mean if he made NMSF, the application to be a finalist requires 80 hours of community service? Just curious, my son filled out his application and I didn’t see it, so I didn’t realize there was a community service component to the application. He has the hours (they do it through school) but I didn’t realize that was a requirement.</p>
<p>The ACT organization should start some similar program since some score much higher on its test. The top scorers on those tests in the 99perc. categorie may not take the PSAT, etc. </p>
<p>Yes, some teachers are harsher graders than others. Have some B’s in AP classes, but have 5’s on the AP national exams. The colleges seem to like the 5’s at least. At the same high school, there are numerous validictorians, many get straight A’s in much easier courses.</p>
). That skill set is not the be-all and end-all of education, and just because a kid doesn’t excel in that area doesn’t mean a kid can’t excel in all the other (usually way way more important) educational skill sets.</p>