<p>woa i just realized- like a third less people get ap national scholar then perfect scores on the SAT- does this mean its even better than a perfect score on college apps?</p>
<p>am i right in thinking that?</p>
<p>I believe so. Let me explain a bit further. The SAT is supposed to show your "potential" to do college level work. The AP test actually shows that you have done college level work. Further, you do not get any college credit for your SAT scores but you can get college credit, advanced standing or placement into more advanced courses with your AP score.</p>
<p>So, I would suggest that earning some of the AP Scholar designations at the end of your junior year can help your application. However, it will depend from school to school. Harvard, for example, asks if you have taken AP tests and what your scores are on thier supplemental application.</p>
<p>For more on this read this topic in the Parents Forum (where I usually read and post):</p>
<p>So AP National Scholar would look better on an application than a perfect score on the SAT?</p>
<p>I would argue against that, darthsidious. A perfect score is more difficult to get - although AP National Scholar might be more rare, it requires only 4's and 5's on 8 exams, which, IMO, isn't too difficult, especially with the nice curves.</p>
<p>Then again ... I suppose it could be argued that it is college material. My argument still stands, though.</p>
<p>Dang, do you guys self study these tests or what? My school didn't allow you to take that many AP's so soon.</p>
<p>Lavender dream,</p>
<p>Not sure what you mean by generous curves on the AP tests. For each test roughly only 15% get a 5 and another 25% get a 4.</p>
<p>Eagle, just because 15% get a 5 and 25% get a 4 doesn't mean that the curves aren't generous. Not all kids who take AP courses can handle college level material, and it is reflected in their sores. However, on average, a 5 on ap test is around 65-75% and for a 4 maybe around 50%. In my opinion, that is ridiculously generous, and as long as you have a good grasp of the material learned in class, you should have no problem getting a 4 or 5.</p>
<p>The way I see it, a perfect score is much much harder to get because one can think of it this way: to get 2400 one needs to answer correctly almost every single question on the SAT in one sitting. To get 8 AP scores of higher than 4 only requires one to answer about 50 to 80 percent of the questions correctly on eight tests in eight different sittings. Although the AP material is arguably "harder" than the SAT because it is college material, the margin of error allotted to the student is incredibly huge when compared to the margin of error allowed by a 2400. Thus, it is much easier to get National Scholar than to score 2400 (besides, there are many easy AP's to pad one's "AP-count" too).</p>
<p>in admissions though, i almost think they should value a bunch of AP 5's above good SAT scores for the reasons cited above. Obviously, the kid can handle a large amount of college material and very well at that. The SAT is more of a defective IQ test, in that measuring "aptitude" will never be as concrete as actual achievement, and faulty because some extremely intelligent people do not do well on it for lack of familiarity with the test/rapid processing etc (friend, verbal IQ of ~160 , 650 on SAT verbal; it's often remarked that among the highly intelligent, perfectionism may inhibit rapid performance)</p>
<p>The SAT, when you think of it, is an extraordinarily unusual situation; after all, in what college are you expected to be able to complete a battery of relatively low-powered exercises within a very narrow time constraint? If anything, I believe that once a student has mastered a certain amount of basic material, the SAT measures mental processing speed and nothing more. </p>
<p>College is about mastering difficult, high-powered situations, making progress in a certain domain, but not rattling off basic knowledge in the shortest amount of time possible; the latter doesn't necessarily demonstrate a great aptitude for learning. An AP, on the other hand, doesn't test basic vocabularly and mathematical common sense; those are skills which are implicitly recommended, almost prerequisite to correctly mastering and manipulating college-level knowledge.</p>
<p>I think that the 2400 will have more of an impact to colleges. A 2400 may be more common, but not every school offers students a chance to get 8 APs by the end of junior year. In fact, probably about 10% of schools do. Every school offers the SAT. Therefore when you think about it, the SAT 2400 is rarer. The SAT makes up a bigger chunk of admissions than AP scores. Colleges don't really care about AP scores that much in admissions. However, I do think National AP Scholar after junior year is a great award and will help. The other scholar awards... not really that big of a help.</p>
<p>Does anyone know when the AP awards are doled out? I think I qualified for National Scholar with exams taken my junior year but haven't received a notification yet.</p>
<p>I remember reading somewhere that the AP awards are given sometime in the fall. I just can't recall where I heard that.</p>
<p>You won't get notification until late fall. However, if you know you met the criteria, you can include "National AP Scholar (expected)" on your applications.</p>
<p>yeah or something like "pending official notification" or whatnot</p>
<p>I actually remember getting awarded (receiving certificate through mail) last year in October.</p>
<p>Last year was very unusual because the Collegeboard changed the requirements for the AP awards, so I think I got mine in late November. However, I hope that this year they do come before the end of October.</p>