Do you think my daughter should bother taking SAT again with a 1520 score?

Hi all,
My daughter is a Junior and has been informed she is definitely to be named a National Merit Semi-Finalist and now her SAT score also makes it likely she will become a finalist. At this point, we are in a financial situation where she is really looking just at those schools that will give either free tuition or full ride offers due to National Merit status. She feels that she wants to take the SAT again because she wants a higher score yet I do not really see the point and think that score is great (and is definitely high enough to get her into UCF or one of the other good NM offering schools). Am I missing anything? If she were ever to receive a perfect score on the SAT would something come out of the woodwork that I do not know about to offer her a huge scholarship based on that? Her other stats are perfect too but I still don’t think anything would change as far as what college she would get into (for free or close to it!). I understand that her competitive nature wants to try for better and I obviously applaud that but am just wondering if it would do anything more than satisfy her own desire to get a better score? As a protective Mom, there is always that chance that her score could go down a little too… I would love your thoughts -Thanks!

No reason to take it again.

Maybe take the ACT and see which works better come application time? My D’s SAT was 20 pts below the maximum scholarship at one of the schools she applied to, but her ACT was enough for it. Since the ACT range is much smaller than the SAT, a single ACT score can be roughly equivalent to a 30pt range in the SAT.

If she is primarily aiming for merit scholarships then I would say SAT 1520 vs 1600 would make some difference. Its an academically competitively pool for merit scholarships.

Maybe she just wants the personal satisfaction of doing better. If she wants to do it, I don’t think it will hurt.

“At this point, we are in a financial situation where she is really looking just at those schools that will give either free tuition or full ride offers due to National Merit status”

For the types of schools that offer free tuition for National Merit, a 1520 SAT score is off the charts. There is absolutely no reason for your daughter to take the test again.

I agree that she doesn’t need to, given the schools that she is looking at.

Good job and congrats to her!

My daughter got 1540 on the first try during junior year, and decided not to take it again. In retrospect this was probably a mistake. She had straight As in a tough curriculum with 10 APs, good ECs and essays, NMF, etc. But out of 13 applications, she was only accepted to her 3 “safeties.” We have to wonder if a higher SAT score would have made a difference.

On the other hand, the safeties were pretty darned selective and the others were all lottery schools. We are extremely pleased with her final choice.

@prodesse Doubtful that an extra 20-40 points would have made a difference. I’d not second guess that choice.

If the safeties were “pretty darned selective” then they were probably matches or reaches for most mortals.

It might make a difference for the $2500 nmf scholarship or if she wants to be nominated for presidential scholars.

If you are not aiming for the tippy top schools, a 1520 is solid for merit aid as she will be considered “off the charts” (agreeing with above post). Congrats!

Disagree here, based upon what I remember reading perhaps 18 months ago from a University of Pittsburgh thread for Class of 2021.

There was a very clear distinction of ACT 36 students getting full scholarships, some 35s getting full, and others half, and everyone lower getting half or less. If you want a full tuition scholarship at a school at this level, you may want to increase your score.

I agree with the recommendations to allow her to take the test one more time. She will likely improve by 20-50 points. And it would allow her to feel that she gave it her all.

But then, as others have suggested, work to get a super ACT.

I say this even though my oldest just wanted to take these exams once and didn’t prep for them. Ended up with 1570 and 34. The latter was disappointing to him but it didn’t matter. He wasn’t going to take either test again.

I would go with whatever the kid wants to do! Is she taking it in June? D looked at the historical trend bad believes June test has the best curve…according to her…usually that is the test for the kids who waited until almost last minute.

D took once in June of her Junior year and came out and said " I think I scored at least 1500 and I am done". She got a 1550 and she was done. She was awarded NMS last year.

I’m not sure which UCF the OP is referring to. I just checked U of Miami. To receive a top merit award, 1/2to tuition, a 1480 is needed.

If she wants to, I don’t see the harm. With superscoring even if you go up in one section and down in another you are still probably better off.

She doesn’t need to take it again. However, if she wants to then she should. As a parent, you could either pay for one more try or tell her she will have to pay herself if it’s that important to her.

I would never push a kid to take the exam again, however, if the money wasn’t an issue I would permit it. So much of this college application journey is psychological. The last thing you want is for her to get a rejection from a school she loves and always wonder whether she would have gotten in if she had only she had been allowed to take the test once more. We might all know thats unlikely, but why run the risk of being blamed for it? If money is the problem, have her work to pay it off.

I would recommend taking them again. I set the “above that it doesn’t matter” at 1550-1560’ish, and I’ve seen the same from many sources.

While 1520 is an outstanding score, when you’re competing for the maximum - either Ivy admission or full scholarships elsewhere - it’s worth the $50 and study time to close that gap if possible. Unless there is some opportunity cost to the test fee and time investment, there’s no downside and large potential upside.

I wouldn’t recommend taking the ACT instead, unless taking the official practice exams shows a strange performance bias to the ACT. Why prep for a different kind of test with different topics when she has already done so well on the SAT and probably knows where to focus to improve.

The OP is asking about taking the SAT again but has stated that the family will only be looking at schools that give National Merit Scholarships. Those schools will be thrilled with an SAT of 1520, and there would be no point in taking it again if it was just for the prestige of a higher score.

However, if she is wants to look at other schools that may give academic scholarships outside of National Merit (Vanderbilt comes to mind with it’s Cornelius scholarship), then my advice would be “maybe.” If all her other “data” such as GPA, subject tests, AP load, leadership, athletics, etc. and especially her writing skills are close to perfection then it probably won’t make a difference.

However, I would like to also point out that the OP also stated that her daughter has been told she will be a NMSF, but those decisions don’t come out until September. I would be a little careful about making that assumption since cutoff scores have been steadily increasing over the past several years. I would only be comfortable saying that if my child’s score was at LEAST two points higher than the 2017 cutoff score. Although it’s being predicted that the scores may settle down this year. I hope so for your sake - free college money is great!