colleges care which subjects i choose?

<p>title says it all. im a science person but i looked at the ush sample questions (not in the booklet) on collegeboard and they were pretty straightforward and easier than the bio questions. does it matter which subjects i choose?</p>

<p>also, what happens if you choose 2 subject tests if the college recommends 3?</p>

<p>Depends on what you're applying for. If you're applying to a science or engineering school or program (Columbia, Penn, Princeton, and Duke have engineering schools; Cornell has science and engineering schools; Brown has an accelerated med program) within a university then you need math/science tests. If you're applying to a university that doesn't differentiate, it won't matter as much.</p>

<p>In general, I would say there are three general rules you should use to decide which tests to take, in this order: (1) what each school requires (such as math), (2) what subjects you'll do best in, and (3) what's relevant to your major.</p>

<p>It's definitely a good idea to spread them out more (Math, a History one, a Lang one) instead of 3 Math&Science ones.</p>

<p>why is it good to spread them out?</p>

<p>taking tests in multiple subjects shows admissions officers that you aren't proficient in only one or two subjects or similar subjects. I'm a science/math geek who also took the SAT II US History. I didn't do very well on it compared to my Math II C and Bio M, but it shows that I'm not horrible in anything other than math and science. If the college/university recommends three, make sure you have three. I consider recommendations more like requirements (just to make them happy). And another thing, if you're going to take a lot of different subjects, realize that school will recieve your entire report because collegeboard sends ALL of your scores, both for SAT reasoning and subject tests. You can pay to have some scores removed, but that's expensive and will add up quickly if you're applying to a lot of schools.</p>

<p>what if i had a bad score on the SAT, submitted a spectacular ACT, but the SAT subject tests were recommended too? they would be seeing my subject scores along with the my sat score =/</p>

<p>CollegeBoard sends all of your SAT related scores - Reasoning and Subject Tests. So yes, colleges will see your SAT score as well.</p>

<p>Yup. They will see everything. That was my problem... my ACT was considerable higher than my SAT score but my SAT II's were either necessary or recommended (plus two of the three were really good scores). I don't think sending in all of my scores hurt me because I haven't been rejected anywhere yet, although that might change come April 1 when I hear back from Yale and Harvard...</p>