There seem to be more guaranteed big scholarships with the National Merit than with an SAT score. Maybe there should be more with the SAT score too, but I don’t find a lot. Those seem to be more competitive than automatic. So for us, the draw is the options it gives us. There are more choices now and in the future if he can get a large scholarship to cover most or all of his college.
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We are still waiting to hear in Michigan. S22 asked today and was told they do not have any letter from NMSC at this time.
On another note, we were looking to send an SAT score the other day and looked at the page on College Board that shows where we had already sent the scores. NMSC was not listed, even though I have the email confirmation saying it would be sent after the April test date. The others were all sent on May 18. I called NMSC today and confirmed they do not have his SAT score. So I guess I’ll call College Board tomorrow and figure out why it wasn’t sent when we ordered it. Something to check…
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Just out of curiosity - has the AE loophole been rampant before COVID or is it a 2022 thing?
A similar thing happened to S20 when he sent his senior year AP scores. He set it as an automatic option, but the scores didn’t get sent.
Good for you for making sure the scores were sent!
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AE has always existed, it was just not well known. And I believe you had to provide documentation/justification for missing the single test date and having the opportunity to test later/multiple times. I suspect most who used it only found out after panicking when a last-minute issue came up preventing a student from testing.
This year, it was opened to pretty much anyone and was widely discussed/promoted, sometimes proactively. Certainly to those who missed the October test because of closure but had the opportunity to take the January test. Many student were suddenly ill on that January date.
It will be quite interesting to see how NMC reacts now that the cat is out of the bag.
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Some colleges offer significant scholarships to NMF students. I can literally change the life of a child who could otherwise not afford college.
To others, like my daughter, it’s not impactful. Only one of the 12 schools to which she is applying offers anything, and that’s $500. No one works for one of the companies offering scholarships, and we’re in the fortunate position that the full $2,500 award won’t meaningfully affect school choice or our finances.
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It seems like for the most part whether people took the PSAT or did AE was based on what was available in their state. My state cancelled the PSAT in almost every single school district. Then the schools offered an in school SAT on April 13. That was the first chance to take the SAT as they kept getting cancelled. The people who submitted to AE in my state were really just competing amongst themselves and it shouldn’t change the end result. I bet that it wasn’t that many kids who faked being sick in states that actually held the PSAT.
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Did anyone get their notice of NMSF based on SAT score?
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wow. just Wow
This year, it was opened to pretty much anyone and was widely discussed/promoted, sometimes proactively. Certainly to those who missed the October test because of closure but had the opportunity to take the January test. Many student were suddenly ill on that January date.
if NMC doesn’t address this I’ll wager that juniors this year ('23) won’t even bother to take the PSAT.
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Yes, it’s a good point on the scholarships. Honestly I’m just bitter that I lost $2500 by not knowing we could just submit an SAT score- I should have spent more time on college confidential! I think he missed the PSAT by a point - he was way out of SAT study mode by then, had I known he could have submitted his SAT score I totally would have skipped the PSAT, he even had to go in in basically a hazmat suit since our schools were closed for a year.
If college board wants to be fair and reasonable and reward people good at taking their standardized tests, they should just take any registered SAT score or the adjusted PSAT score and pick the top from that. Otherwise it’s waste of resources to “prepare” for a test you already aced.
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At our school, the PSAT was cancelled twice. My kiddos were fully willing to take it, but it was not offered. An AE was only offered once at their school, in a huge gym with lots of noise and with masks on. The principal discouraged kids from taking it, saying to weigh the risk with Covid.
Thus maybe only 15% of the kids took the test. Probably the most serious students that would normally score higher anyways. Unfortunately my other child does not do well with a mask on and thus missed the cut off. As a 10th grader she would have easily qualified. She also did horrible on the AP test that was required to be in school with a mask on. She got all 5s on AP tests taken without a mask. Plus California has one of the higher required score. If we lived in Miss. she would have made it. We have to accept that she did not get a fair chance on the PSAT or AE with a mask on but life is not fair and thus I think to discount anyone’s achievement by saying the integrity is ruined with AE is not right.
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Same thing happened to our school, no psat was offered and Sat was offered only once and to 120kids only and all students took the test with Mask on.
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I had to wear a mask and plastic gloves. The mask I could handle, it was the crinkling sweaty mandatory plastic gloves that drove me crazy. No other school that I know of required gloves for testing.
This is a really good summary. However, it wasn’t just the kids who called out sick for the January exam. Skypetutor also encouraged those who sat for the October PSATs and did not feel like they did well to cancel those scores. If a score cancellation was accepted by NMSC (and almost every cancellation was honored… even just the “I was stressed over COVID” excuse), your AE application was accepted. The abuse this year was rampant. Sadly with such a relatively small number of semifinalists per state, it does not take much abuse to significantly move the needle.
For people in states that were closed for most of the year, the playing field was probably fairly level. In Georgia where very few tests were cancelled (both PSAT and SAT), the abuse was high. People opted out of the PSAT so that they could have EIGHT different attempts on the SAT. Given enough testing opportunities and a more forgiving SI calculation, borderline students could reach the SI cutoff for their state. That’s not what the NMF competition is supposed to be.
If NMSC reveals that AE did factor into the cutoffs, especially in states that were open, that’s a very good indication that abuse occurred.
On the bright side, my daughter received official confirmation of being named a NMSF today (SI of 225 in GA). She has heard from her friends that the cutoff in GA is 219. She knows students with 218 who did not make the cut and students with 219 who did. This is just self reporting from her friends so take it with a grain of salt.
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Gloves-that is ridiculous! What City is that so can make sure I never go there.
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We’re also waiting to hear, here in the UK. Last year, D22’s school announced the semi-finalists at the school’s first assembly of the school year but nothing so far one week into the new school year (1st assembly was last Friday).
For those who have received notice, is the application relatively straightforward? The 3-week window from notification on 15 Sept to submission deadline seems a bit tight. I saw the essay prompt above, which applicants can copy from their Common App essay (if they wrote about these topics, which D22 has done).
Yes, the application is easy. My daughter looked at the portal for the first time this evening. She will be finished with her application by the end of this weekend.
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Good to hear. Thanks.
Congratulations to your daughter! I so hope you are correct about the GA cutoff of 219! My son has a 220 but we haven’t heard anything yet. No one at the school knows anything. I even called NMSC and was told we should be getting a letter in mid-September, which to me implies he will get Commended rather than SF.
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Good luck to your son. Hopefully, you hear something soon. I hesitated to even mention the 219. I am praying her friends are sharing accurate information.
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