high percentile, mediocre score

Test Preparation
1

<p>When I got back my SAT results in the mail, I was amazed at the percentile I fell into on a national level with my "mediocre" math score of 670. I figured that collegeboard tries to set a 700 on the math component of an SAT around 90th percentile, but surprisingly my 670 put me in the 90th percentile nationally and 89th percentile in Massachusetts. I guess many people didn't do so well in May. Is there any other way to explain this phenomena?</p>

<p>PS: Definitely need to retake in October and prepare. I forgot many of the tricks I learned in Algebra one which would help with these types of these problems. I guess when one starts learning calculus its easy to forget simple math.</p>

2

<p>I have no additional info but I'm in the exact same situation as you score-wise.</p>

3

<p>Percentiles are based off last year's scores, so it doesn't matter that more people did bad in May.</p>

4

<p>that makes perfect sense..It would be the reason why the collegeboard did not show percentiles for the new writing section yet...ty gexxman</p>

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<p>PS: Definitely need to retake in October and prepare. I forgot many of the tricks I learned in Algebra one which would help with these types of these problems. I guess when one starts learning calculus its easy to forget simple math.</p>

<p>same problem here. and same math score as well, though not on the May test.</p>

<p>an explanation is probably the killer curve. you can only miss like 1 (maybe 2? I don't know) on the Math section to get an 800. Verbal is much much more generous.</p>

6

<p>Ebony, recently you haven't been able to miss any to get an 800...blah.</p>

7

<p>yeah...I just want to retake and break a 2100 so I can apply to maybe 1 Ivy. My friend who is a tutor for Kaplan told me the magic number at most Ivy league schools (to even be considered) is a 1400 (or 2100 new). All the schools, however, will accept someone with ridiculously low SAT score if the person's parents make a nice "contribution" to the university. I love how colleges implore the spoils system.</p>

8

<p>Doesn't implore mean to ask/beg?</p>

9

<p>yup. it should be employ.</p>

10

<p>A 710, was a 96th percentile, which still baffles me. To think that you can walk down a street with 99 people and only 3 people did better than me in reading (I never liked reading, I don't even read when it's required... I'm more of a math person). Yeah I kind of hoped 96th percentile would be a little higher. I missed 6th and ommitted one. I was hoping for maybe a 730 with a 96 percent.</p>

11

<p>Don't look into percentiles too deeply. Scores are scores, & we all know what the averages are at the top universities.</p>

<p>However, a good benchmark for the old SAT would be 99th percentile, which was a 1470. A score around 2200 will serve as a similar standard in future years.</p>

12

<p>A 760 was the 99th percentile. haha. I am better than 99% of the people who took the SAT (in math at least)! :D
lol</p>

13

<p>sometimes its the exact opposite</p>

<p>for example, an 800 in sat2 chinese is about a 50th percentile</p>

14

<p>no.. 700 is 95 percentile if u look at a traditional bell curve.</p>

15

<p>confidential...the SAT has long since abandoned a strict normal bell curve, especially with the SAT 2s.</p>

16

<p>I had a 740 in may and it was 97th percentile.</p>

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<p>yeah, I confuse words a lot of the time. I should have used employ. Regardless, I was able to employ some writing skill on my SATs because I got a 740 on the writing section. I implore your clemency</p>