<p>do you think that an 87 overall average is good enough for SPS?
i also have varsity field hockey, all honors classes, all A's in all classes, and a lot of community service.
do i have a chance at SPS or Taft? i am pretty sure i'm okay for SGS</p>
<p>I think we might need some more information but so far so good! What are you EC's? What are your SSAT scores? What are you passionate about?</p>
<p>Look at some more "chances" threads and post back :) I'll be glad to share my opinion with you!</p>
<p>i think taht's a great score! SPS's average is like 82% or something, so your doing great! i'd expect an acceptance letter! :)</p>
<p>SPS medium is 88%. </p>
<p>I think since it is SSAT time we are all (my son and his classmates included) getting too caught up in the importance of the scores. The scores put you IN THE GAME. So to answer this poster's quesiton, yes, an 87% will put you in the game at those schools. It will in no way guarantee you admission. Neither will 99% (at any school for that matter). </p>
<p>There are a lot of threads that talk about the important aspects of the application. By and large everyone agrees that the SSAT's are one of the LEAST important. However a VERY low score (and by very low, I do not mean in the 80's or even 70's) can hurt you if the rest of your application isn't strong. </p>
<p>Relax everyone and remember that high scores are not the **key **to admission.</p>
<p>I don't know where you got 82. but that number is completely false.</p>
<p>I have a similar problem. I got 91% on verbal, 87% on Math, and a 42% on reading!!! a 82% overall... I'm really disappointed. However, I have a cadre of great EC.</p>
<p>I know bad SSAt scores don't mean you won't get into a school, but better ones would. I mean, If you had the same uncanny ECs as someone else, and they got a better SSAT score, they'll chose the one with the better score won't they?? unless your filthy rich and your the son of Bill gates...</p>
<p>that 82% number for St. pauls was prob. gotten from boardingschoolreview.com </p>
<p>How much do you think the SSAT score would influence the school's decision??</p>
<p>87% is fair on reading but I think that that isnt the only factor. There is really NO way to base anything off of simple percentiles.</p>
<p>A child prodigy with ho-hum sports from a richy-rich town like Greenwich, CT who has a 99% SSAT and invented the toaster might be rejected to make room for a person of color who is from a less represented area like, say, Kansas. They could have a 87% SSAT, 3 varisty letters, stellar teacher recs, and hiked the appalatian mountains with their family last year to raise money for cancer. Both are superb but now you see how many diffrent things each interviewer and admissions rep. must take in.</p>
<p>I guess basing it off SSATs ONLY...your "good" for SGS and "almost average" for SPS. Imagine 88% being a flat C...its the average. Dead center. That would place your scores in the C category. Average.</p>
<p>I have to differ with Cricket here. </p>
<p>87% at SPS does not mean you are "average" or a "C." It PUTS YOU IN THE GAME. That is pretty much all the SSAT is used for. To put you in the game or do you need something eles to put you in the game (Great grades, athlete, legacy, etc.). As someone mentioned on another topic, if the score is single digits, they worry. None of them, I repeat, NONE of them alone will get you in. It is low on the importance list. The difference between an 87 and a 92 for example, in your SPS application is pretty much nothing. </p>
<p>iHerc, there are many threads about the important aspects of the application, do a quick search and you'll find a few. </p>
<p>There are MANY cases of 99%, stellar grades and EC's not getting into an "elite." There are even cases of legacies not getting in.<br>
I personally know a girl who has a building named after her family at one of the "elites," her brother currently attends it as have many family members and she did NOT get in. She's doing a year at a Jr. Prep with the hopes of re-applying for 10th grade.</p>
<p>I also know a kid who got into 2 of the 3 "elites" he applied to. The one he didn't, accepted a classmate of his with lower SSAT scores and lower grades.</p>
<p>My son had "lunch meetings" with admissions reps from about 12-15 schools this year at his school. There was a variety (top "tier", second "tier") of them represented (all met seperately with 8-10 students at a time) and at each meeting a student would ask about SSAT scores. Some wouldn't give a range that they accept, some didn't, **ALL **but one said it was the least important aspect of the application. The one was Milton and they simply emphasized how their medium is over 90% but didn't say how important it was. Even there however, and 87 would still put you in the game.</p>
<p>Well, if they're from Greenwich, they COULD get in because they donated a lot of money to the school, or don't need money in the first place, or their school has a history of sending kids to prep school (which they usually do).</p>
<p>There are a lot of people in my grade from Greenwich. About three. And that's only girl boarders. About one day student or so.</p>
<p>Linda:</p>
<p>Well, if you base it on a curve, then yes, it IS a C. Colleges base their grades on a scale of who did the best on a specific test or overall during the year. Top students get A's and the students with the average result could get C's. If a college student gets a 95 on the test while 1/2 of the other students get 100 and the other 1/2 get a 90, the 95 student would indeed get a C. Its on the curve.</p>
<p>So, technically, this is college prep school, is it not? On a curve he'd be a C in SPS but a B+ in a regular atmosphere.</p>
<p>I see what you mean, but schools, even all colleges, don't grade on curves. I never once got a "curved" grade in college.</p>
<p>The percintile **is not the same as the **percent. It tells you that you have scored higher than, 87% of the students of the same sex in the same grade as you that have taken the test in the last 3 years. the percent would be figured by taking the number of questions on the test and the figuring out the percent that you got correct. In theory, you could get 97 percentile but only 85% correct. </p>
<p>In any case, an 87% on the SSAT is perfectly fine for an application to SPS.</p>
<p>So if you think 87% is a C, then people who got a 60%ile (or lower) for the SSAT have effectively failed? Sheesh. There's a Spongebob episode where he's bumfuzzled by a device called the "Orb of Confusion," and I think I'm about to play ball with that object...but if we're going to look at the SSAT through the looking glass and attempt to assign letter grades, with C being the average or middle of the bell curve, then the 50%ile scores would be a C. And 87%ile is sitting pretty with an A in that case.</p>
<p>OMG...I'm pretty sure that I'll want to delete this after 20 minutes, so later on, if anyone reads this, it was my 10 year-old talking about letter grade equivalents for the SSAT, and I just left my computer on unattended.</p>
<p>50% would be C range on the curve if you base it off of every person who took the SSAT that period. It would mean 50% did better and 50% did worse. Your in the "average".</p>
<p>Obviously, SPS is a very good school, causing their SSAT scores to be higher then most others. When their scores are higher it means that their average is higher. What is expected is higher.</p>
<p>If we switch the pool of students to all SPS students rather then all the children taking the SSATs the results would be diffrent.</p>
<p>Take Billy. He got a 88% on his SSATs. Above average compared to all SSAT takers but average compared to those students who go to SPS. On the curve, Billy is "C range" at SPS but it would equal a B+ (or whatever a 87 equals) if you change his competitors.</p>
<p>If Billy took the test with only child prodigies as his competition rather then other random students, with the EXACT same scores he can very well be in the 30th precentile. A majority of those "superhuman intellectual" boys and girls are smarter then him.</p>
<p>When you take the SSATs it matters on who you take it with. Are the people that season smarter or less intellectual then you are?</p>
<p>The "average" SPS students are smarter then 88% of the test-takers their season. 50% did better. 50% did worse. Average.</p>
<p>thanks for your input...
the second post or so, someone said read the chances board, what else should i put here? </p>
<p>I am caucasian, applying for ninth grade, all the schools i interviewed at they told me they could imagine me at the school, uh....
what else should i put?</p>
<p>oh and a little input on that 87% = C... I was told numerous times at the ssat class i was taking taht 70 would even be good... but that a C would be in the 50 - 60 range not high 80s range... just one thing i heard</p>
<p>oh and crickett, i noticed that you had put your grades for first quarter.. ehre are mine, they are in numerical value though.. like 90% </p>
<p>Spanish 2- 91, effort 1 for all classes
Honors Algebra 1- 93
Chemistry- 90
Honors English- 86
History- 92</p>
<p>Stellar grades, Ren :) Congratulations.</p>
<p>Again, with the 87=C thing. If you read my post before this one I explained it to the best of my abilities. 87th percentile is fabulous when you base it off of all test takers but SPS students are above average and very intelligent. The average student in SPS would test higher then the average student taking the test "for yucks".</p>
<p>oh okay.. sorry i might have skipped a few of thsoe little posts in there... sorry about that! </p>
<p>oh okay i got that... my tour guide when i went said his average was a 97% on the ssat... i just said wow<br>
so i really get that an 87 could be a C..</p>
<p>Yes, but even if it is the average you still have an excellent shot!! Your "the average" SPS student! Be happy!</p>
<p>PM me if you have questions!</p>
<p>okay thanks!</p>
<p>You do realize, don't you, that you're starting off by limiting your population to people with scores that all qualified for admission to SPS. Then you say that students who aren't in the top half of that pool are sucking wind because they're just "C" students. If you're going to limit the pool to only people who are qualified -- or actually -- admitted to SPS, then being in the middle of that pool is desirable. </p>
<p>Still, this whole idea of assigning letter grades to SSAT scores is just absurd -- even if we didn't have the added layer of inside-out ontological reductionism thrown in for added comic relief. If the median for SPS is 88%ile, then 87%ile is definitely in the running. It's better than the scores of about half of the kids already at SPS -- which is impressive any way you slice it (unless we're using your knife).</p>
<ol>
<li>what does ontological mean.. sorry i don't have a too large vocabulary. </li>
<li>i don't know the assigning a letter grade to grades at all... we dont' at our school and i frankly just don't like it </li>
<li>middle= pretty good for me.. though i do desire to be on top</li>
</ol>