<p>I called an admissions representative at Harvard and he said that "readers of the application" see all of your test scores, but when the committee meets to formally make a decision they are only give the highest test scores in each section. My question is, do the readers of the application also CONSIDER your highest scores, and how do they spot the highest scores, i.e., does some secretary pick out the highest scores and total them, or is it left to the reader to do it?</p>
<p>Secondly, do 3 SATIIs count the same as the new SAT Reasoning test, because the Academic Index says that each score (whether it be a section of the SAT or a SATII) counts the same.</p>
<p>So... I was curious about this. I was in Cambridge already for RSI at MIT, so I randomly decided to attend one of the Harvard admissions "information sessions". While I was there, I specifically asked "do you consider SAT IIs beyond the highest three in your admissions decisions?". I was told that they "mostly" look at the top three, but that (of course) they see all of them. The woman answering the questions almost seemed to be hinting that they do sometimes consider other tests. Almost enough to make me take more.. lol (but not quite).</p>
<p>The academic index is already calculated for all applicants when the readers see their applications... so I assume that some data entry person does it beforehand.</p>
<p>wow...the admissions officer ADMITTED to you that they use an academic index...i thought that people knew abt it, but it was never actually acknowledged...</p>
<p>Randomperson, just to clarify:
So you claim that some data entry person provides the highest scores, the academic index, and the actual collegeboard report w/ all the scores to the readers?</p>
<p>Well, I pretty sure that they openly acknowledge the use of an academic index (it's actually mandatory for ivy league schools evaluating athletes - that's where it comes from). For instance, this is a quote from "What It Really Takes to Get Into the Ivy League", by Chuck Hughes (a former Harvard admissions dean):</p>
<p>"Every student admitted to an Ivy League university has a calculated AI, although in nonathletic cases it is rarely looked at as part of the admissions decision-making process."</p>
<p>So he says that it's calculated for everyone, just not considered very much for anyone except athletes.</p>
<p>In Michelle Hernandez's book "A is for Admission", the process is described much more clearly. The academic index is already calculated (by data entry people/technicians) for every applicant, and appears in the materials that readers receive. However, readers also see the entire score report. Hernandez's thesis, essentially, is that the Academic Index makes much more of a difference than most admissions officers admit. Hughes's book, on the other hand, seems to be a pathetic exercise in self-justification - he puts literally every admissions practice in a favorable light - so he probably downplayed the significance of AI.</p>
<p>What the Harvard admissions officer did tell me (because it was the subject of my question... I wasn't very clear in the previous post, I guess) was that they see all subject test scores, and "mostly" look at the top 3 SAT IIs. To me, the word "mostly" implied that they do sometimes consider other scores.</p>