"Flummoxed" by new SAT Score Choice Policies? Check out the NYT's "The Choice"

Test Preparation
101

<p>Bluebayou, if you look at my statement, I try to say that the number of tests IS a factor when comparing like candidates from Beverly Hills or like candidates from Harlem. I am saying that test history is a factor ALL ELSE BEING EQUAL. That doesn’t mean it is going to outweigh many other more important factors. </p>

<p>And I´m sure they would very much care if a hooked candidate took it “two dozen times” (hyperbole understood).</p>

<p>Broetchen, I don´t think there is any inconsistency at all in these two positions by Penn. It seems they consider taking the SAT more than three times is equivalent to treating it like an extra-curricular activity.</p>

<p>Personally, I think taking it more than twice (like was usually done in my time) is too many. But, okay, if you need three tries to reach your “goal” score and think that´s going to help you, do it…but I still think it´s preferable to reach that score in one or two tries, or even a score that may be a little lower in one try. People can choose to take it as much as it suits them, but adcoms have a right to see it, if they so choose.</p>

<p>*In post 98 I meant to say NON SC schools in first sentenc and third line of my second paragraph. Hope it didn´t confuse too much.</p>

102

<p>Amazing this debate is still raging.</p>

103

<p>Bayou: You are incorrect about your SAT II example, where a person could spend 2 hours filling in bubbles on the one-hour test that “counted” and then the last couple of minutes just randomly fill on the bubbles on the test that did not count. The “test that did not count” would appear as a score on the student’s SAT II record. You cannot cancel the test that did not count unless you cancel the whole sitting, thus automatically cancelling the score of the test that you wanted to count and which you cheated on. The SAT folks got wise to that cheat.</p>

104

<p>^^ That’s what I thought, but my friend decided to resit chemistry, then got halfway through and decided it wasn’t going to be as good as his first one, rubbed it all out, and come scores day he only had one score. Now he could have easily just used the time on his chem SAT for his first SAT subject and no one knows.</p>