Have questions? Ask an Andover Freshmen!!

<p>Okay I got my SSAT scores and I did horrible and procrastinated during it and I jumped into it last minute. My overall score was 1974 and 38 percentile. I don’t have much of a chance right?</p>

<p>hey shinelikemystar. Sorry for the late reply. Had a rough week. Honestly, the score doesn’t help you that much. Hopefully, your essays, interview, and recommendations went well enough to get you in!</p>

<p>Best of luck!</p>

<p>It also sometimes helps to take the ssat one more time, despite the deadline, and tell them your improved score (just so that if that was the case and you got waitlisted, you could be taken off, or even get accepted!).</p>

<p>Ahh, do you think it’d be worth it. The thing is I jumped into it the night before with no idea of what was going on. Is it at all possible to get in with a 38%? My alumni representive really liked me, and he told me he would write a good recommendation for me, I know my personal and English teacher wrote a good recommendation too. Not sure about my math teacher - he’s a bit harsh. I also had okay EC’s but nothing too crazy good.</p>

<p>Btw, can you tell me what you crazy week was like? I need to get an idea of what a crazy week is like at andover.</p>

<p>Oh and how did you prepare for it? Any books you recommend?</p>

<p>Crazy week: sports practice for 2 hours every day, 4 hour swim meet on Wednesday, lab report, 2 tests, spanish presentation and essay. for the essay, I had confirmation at 11:00 pm saying that my thesis needed to be changed for my 6 page essay, so I was up till 3 doing it. That was a tough week!</p>

<p>I looked on quizlet.com for vocab study guides, looked over grammatical rules online, and went over previous year’s notes for math. I also purchased the Princeton Review ssat book, which did help a lot!</p>

<p>Oh, and I also recommend Wordly Wise. (I think thats how you say it…i get confused…)I bought the 9th book second edition. It helped ALOT! I studied it just the night before and like half the words I studied came out on the SSAT vocab section. And I didn’t even finish the book. It’s kinda like a workbook. If you want the answers to the exercises, then u also have to buy the teacher’s edition, but I just memorized the words coz the definitions were in the book. </p>

<p>I think that was seriously what made my SSAT score so much higher. That and my Reading Comprehension. :)</p>

<p>Hope it helps! Good luck! :)</p>

<p>Ahh see the thing is that although I am a great student with a 4.0 gpa, in dance, active in some community volunteering school clubs, vp of my class, president of fccla, etc with I guess pretty good recommendations, my ssat throws me off and it obviously does not reflect who I really am academically.</p>

<p>Do you think I could still have a chance with what I have? Will they look past my ssat? Btw I’m also applying for FA so that will probably decrease my chances greatly.</p>

<p>Thanks for all your help guys! </p>

<p>Would it be worth it retaking in march?I don’t know if I want to spit out another 200 dollars for it plus the price of a prep book.</p>

<p>I don’t know if I will be applying for the following fall if I dont make it this year…</p>

<p>If you’re retaking in march, then I don’t think there’s any point. Hopefully, your other parts of the application can get you in. Also, Andover is need blind admission, so they disregard your financial situation during the application process, and grant you the aid you need once accepted.</p>

<p>Do Andover still meet the financial needs of all intls? I’m under the impression they don’t, but they do say that they fulfil 100% of demonstrated need</p>

<p>shinelikemystar - A March SSAT would not have any impact on your decisions this spring unless you wanted to file a late application somewhere. And, to be honest, getting financial aid is extremely difficult for a late applicant. (Not impossible, but pretty darned close to it!)</p>

<p>UKgirl23: I’m honestly not sure as to if they meet the financial needs of every accepted applicant (never really looked into it). All I know is that Andover is need blind in acceptance.</p>

<p>dodgersmom: thanks for the input!</p>

<p>First of all, thanks for this great thread and taking your time to answer all of our questions!</p>

<p>Ok, so my question: Was it difficult to adjust to a strict schedule, higher workload, dorm life, etc.? Sorry if my question’s already been asked; I don’t feel like going through 16 pages o’ fun. Thx in advance! Keep it going.</p>

<p>Fascination: no problem! glad I can help :D</p>

<p>So as to the adjustment, it actually never felt like I had a hard time adjusting, but I think my grades showed the opposite. After fall term, you start to realize what you need to prioritize. For instance, I would think I had so much free time on the weekends because of less homework. Now I realize that I need to spend that time studying, and maybe devote 4 hours to free time each day instead of 7 (trust me, you will think you have that much time!). I honestly had no trouble adjusting to the schedule and dorm life. Just the idea of actually studying and prioritizing my time was a big issue that I needed to jump on.</p>

<p>Was it hard leaving home and your parents</p>

<p>I can’t say it was hard leaving home, but it was different. I didn’t get that legit home sickness that many kids got ( I know some who got so homesick, they dropped out for the year). I missed my parents, but never longed for home. I was just put into such an accepting community from the start that it was kind of hard to think about what you didn’t have with you versus what PA offered not only as a school, but as a home</p>

<p>How hard is it to maintain a steady/good grade? What is even considered a good grade in the 6 point scale? </p>

<p>Is it necessarily hard to receive a six?</p>

<p>It is VERY hard to maintain steady/good grades. Here, at least for the most part, a 5 is a good grade that ANYONE should be happy with. 4s are considered ok, (equivalent to B-). and yes it is very hard to get a 6 (whenever you do, you scream and dance like you’ve never done before :D)</p>

<p>Is there competition between others in terms of grades and class rank or is it more of an environment where you learn from others?</p>

<p>More of learning from others than anything. Granted there will be those people who brag about their high grades and make you feel dumb all the time, you will try and learn from other people’s strengths, and let them learn from yours as well</p>