Hi guys, I’ve been wondering about this for awhile but couldn’t come up with a clear answer. I’m planning to take ACT in upcoming November. But recently, my friend told me that even though colleges claim they don’t have preference of one test over the other, they still prefer SAT because ACT is easier than SAT. I know this is not true at all but it still makes me feel anxious because I was kind of swayed by what he said. He is also planning to take ACT in October so I asked him why is he taking ACT when he belittles it. He told me that he already took the SAT and college admission people will be impressed if he scores well on both SAT and ACT. But from my knowledge, if a student sends scores from both tests, college admission people will choose the one that has higher score and not consider the other. So it doesn’t really impress them just because he took both tests. They’ll simply pick the higher one and use that score for the rest of evaluation. So my real question is that is it better to take both SAT and ACT and get medium scores on both than to focus on one test (ACT in my case) and do very well on that one test? I’d also like to know whether or not ACT is easier than SAT (I know it’s not, but I want to hear your opinions). I heard some students do much better on ACT than on SAT and vice versa.
There is no ACT test in November. Except for one college, colleges accept either the SAT or ACT without preference and do not treat one as better than the other. The one college that has a stated preference Is California Polytechnic San Luis Obispo, a college in a state where the SAT has for many decades been the test taken by most high school students. It prefers the ACT.
If you submit both tests to a college, it will use for admission that test believed to have the higher score.The exception to that there are a small number of colleges that actually superscore the combined tests, e.g., Georgia Tech uses the higher of the SAT or ACT math, combined with the higher of the SAT reading or ACT English, combined with the higher of the SAT writing or ACT combined English/writing score.
Those that claim one test is favored more than another typically have no real evidence to show that and are biased according to where they are from, i.e. those who claim the SAT is preferred are usually from a state where most high school students take the SAT, and those who claim the ACT is preferred are from a state where most students take the ACT. Finally, for you to believe what they are saying,you have to first conclude that all the colleges that claim they have no preference and do not favor one test over the other are just liars, an unlikely conclusion.
There are those that find the ACT easier than the SAT and vice versa. Majority who take both score in the same percentile ranges on both tests. Some score better on the ACT and some the SAT. ACT tends to have fewer trick questions than the SAT but has more time pressure than the SAT.