<p>I'm from Pennsylvania, and my guidance counselor said it's important to do well on the PSSAs because they go on our transcript. Do colleges actually care about state tests? It's not an issue for me; I got advanced in all subjects. But I'm just curious...</p>
<p>You need to pass them to graduate. My bet is NO COLLEGE ON EARTH looks a the scores. In Maryland, they are minimum competency tests and the private school kids don’t take them. My theory is that the reason the scores drop in eighth grade is that kids have finally figured out that they don’t count for anything for the student. Your counselor just doesn’t want the word to get out.</p>
<p>I don’t see why they would look at them. Colleges don’t have the time to figure out what scores mean in all 50 states, and they have enough standardized test scores to look at. Why would they compare performance on 50 different tests when they could just compare SAT and ACT? And, as stated above, many private school students don’t even take them.</p>
<p>If your state offers some type of recognition for state tests (a la National Merit), however, that could certainly go on a college app, though depending on the college I don’t know that it would mean much.</p>
<p>You are from PA? Really? I thought you were from Ponyville, Equestria. Just kidding.
I’m from PA as well. Passing the PSSA’s is a graduation requirement, but it will not be used to evaluate a student in the admissions process.</p>
<p>Not unless you failed.</p>