<p>From an admissions standpoint, is it <em>truly</em> all right to submit only an ACT? I know colleges say they are the same and they'll accept either one, but what goes on behind closed doors? Is there a preference?</p>
<p>probly sat since its so comon but i dont think it matters a lot, after all the conversion charts exist for a reason. they prob like sat more cuz theyre more used and a better indicator of the national average. act aint so popular. grrr collegeboard</p>
<p>I would say that there is no bias against or for the act unless the college specifically admits there is....now that the act is nearly as popular as the sat (1.2 million vs 1.375 million tests)....i figure that the admissions people just cant afford to discriminate like this since that would mean discrimination against huge numbers of students...</p>
<p>if you submit both would they only look at the higher one?</p>
<p>posted by JSB on another thread (talking about Yale):</p>
<p>"According to the College Board website, less than 5% of the freshman class took the ACT without the SAT. I wouldn't personally put myself in that minority."</p>
<p>thoughts?</p>
<p>There are many applicants to the top ivy league schools in the northeast and other states where the SAT has generally been considered the test of choice, who take the SAT and if they dont perform well, take the ACT. If they perform better on the ACT they send that instead. Where the applicant from areas where the SAT has been considered the test of choice for the ivy league, submit the ACT and the subject tests, the ivy league schools can feel confident that they took just the ACT and did not take the SAT I Reasoning test. However, where the applicant is from the northeast or other states where the SAT is the test of choice, and submits just the ACT with writing and no subject tests (even if they are not required by the college), the ivy league schools may suspect that that applicant took the SAT I Reasoning test and did not perform well (whenever SAT II subject tests are sent, the SAT I scores are sent also). Thus, it is possible that the ivy league might look more favorably upon an applicant from the same area who submitted high SAT I scores. There are many applicants who take the SAT I and do not do well, but who test better on the ACT and submit an ACT score than when converted is significantly higher than they had received on the SAT I.
There are some recruited athletes, legacies ect who will not receive any speculation about just submitting the ACT with writing. However, it is possible that college admission officers will wonder about those who submitted just the ACT with writing.
WHere there is an applicant with lets say a 750 m and 750 verbal from one geographic area, and another applicant with say a 34 ACT from the same area, the colleges have no way of knowing if the applicant with the 34 really earned a 630m 650 v on the SAT I but performed better on the ACT and just submitted that.
One can obviously get in with the ACT alone, but I think that sending in the SAT II scores also prevents speculation. The ACT is gaining popularity but with only 5% of those accepted at the ivy league submitting just the ACT score, one does not know how many of those applicants were legacies, development cases or recruited athletes.</p>
<p>from everything i've read, admit committees are well aware of the prepping capabilities for the SAT and the lack thereof for the ACT.
true or not, it could explain why you see a 1350 in a common data set and a 28 being treated as equal for admission.</p>
<p>Yes, but they are also well aware that with the ACT you only have to send your highest scores and they dont see anything else. There are applicants who for example will take the SAT I and lets say get scores of 600, 610, 620, after perhaps two or three tries taking the SATI I and then take the ACT twice and first get lets say a 30 and then lets say a 32, and just submit the 32, and the admission officers only see the 32 and have no idea that they have all those scores.
There may be a lot of prepping by some for the SAT but the colleges see all the scores. If an applicant has a 750, 750 750 for example, the colleges will see that they might have scored somewhat lower on two other tries.
I am not saying there is anything wrong with the ACT. It is a test that is becoming more popular. I am just saying that where an applicant is from the northeast or another state where the SAT is much more popular especially for the ivy league and other top tier schools, and submits just the ACT and not any subject tests (even if the subject tests are not required), the admission officers might wonder if they took the SAT and did not perform well. Perhaps they might not care. I just think they might wonder.</p>
<p>However, there is now more incentive than ever to take the ACT because most schools are now accepting the ACT with writing in lieu of SAT I and II. Therefore, you can get the whole thing out of the way in one testing session and at less cost. You can retake and only send in the scores you like without having to worry about the SAT II issue. I think that more and more students in all parts of the country are going to see this as an attractive alternative and as time goes on, there will be more students only submitting ACT scores. Also, with the recent scoring issues with College Board, students are leery of them.</p>
<p>I do agree. I just think it might take a few years for the ivy league and top tier colleges to get to that point. As of now, only about 5% of acceptances at some ivy league schools went to those who submitted the ACT only. I dont know how accurate that number is. Also we dont know how many actually applied who submitted ACT scores only</p>
<p>more schools are now utilizing the highest subset of multiple act dates--it's a small number now but appears to be a growing trend. check with your school--you may be suprised.</p>
<p>That is interesting. Thanks</p>
<p>it seems like the best choice for someone who was a fan of the ACT to take some subject tests, completely forgo SAT I, and take the ACT w/ writing. Or at leats, thats what i gathered from this thread.</p>
<p>even though there are way more prep classes for SAT, i do not believe a person can score above 2200 after one of those classes unless the kid was already innately smart and just a little lazy</p>
<p>that said, i think SAT is harder than ACT since ACT does not test vocab and is more straightforward; i believe many experienced college admissions officers would also know this, and thus favor the ACT</p>
<p>in addition, especially at the ivies, nearly 100% of the applicants send in SAT scores while only a quarter or so send in ACT; better context means more information, which is always good for admissions officers since the average for the ACT at Harvard, let's say, could have been a 35 if everyone had taken it, but since not everyone did, college adcoms may keep a person with a 34 on the fence...</p>
<p>also, a person can choose which scores to send for ACT, which i think would motivate colleges to prefer the SAT, since that 34/35/36 could have been gotten in one try, or in ten tries</p>
<p>My daughter took the ACT only and we live in SAT country. She is attending an Ivy, and is not a legacy, development case (I wish!), or recruited athlete (she wishes!). She did take some SAT IIs -- however, her scores weren't that great so she didn't report them. I have heard of other SAT-land ACT takers that ride them alone into the Ivy League.</p>
<p>We got sick of people around here thinking what she was doing was "risky." What, riskier than sending in lower scores on another test! (I assume the score would have been lower -- she didn't like the format of the SAT I so never even took it) </p>
<p>Most people don't go with just the ACT because they are sheep and have heard that Ivies and the like "prefer" the SAT. Never mind that the schools deny this. The advice comes from what used to be true years ago and it has been self-perpetuating.</p>
<p>I see no reason not to take the schools at their word. They are perfectly able to require one specific test or to say they prefer it. The fact that essentially all schools have moved away from doing this is significant.</p>