<p>I took the SAT 4 times (twice in the fall of junior year, once in spring of junior, and once in fall of Senior). I did this for a number of reasons:</p>
<li>My GCs said that you should take it as many times as you want and it doesn’t matter, colleges only see your highest score.</li>
<li>I thought that since the SAT was changing I should take the old one twice and the new one twice.</li>
<li>I was not satisified with my score and felt I could do a lot better.</li>
</ol>
<p>I realize now that it was a mistake to take it so many times. How will colleges look at this? Is this going to ruin my chances?</p>
<p>Many admissions officers from top schools, as well as some crappy, told us not to. There is no reason to take it more than 3 times. For psychological, monetary, and other reasons.</p>
<p>To my knowledge, most schools don't care how many times you take the SATs. In fact, a Penn regional director told me that they literally do not know how many times you've taken it by the time your application gets to the admissions board room.</p>
<p>I don't know if colleges care how many times you take it but I don't think you can say that they only see your highest score. When you request your scores sent by College Board, the report they send has ALL your scores.</p>
<p>I noticed on one of the UC "my app" sites (can't recall which campus but think it was UCSD) they listed her self-report test scores and both sets of official scores.</p>
<p>i did the exact same thing you did, and the funny thing is that i did my best the last time i took it (october of my senior year.) i think that if colleges did question you taking it four times, they would discover that you did take both the old and the new and would let it slide because it is different than taking the same test four times.</p>
<p>i've heard that colleges do see how many times theperson has taken the SAT and stick to the most consistent score.
it is recommended that you take the SAT a 2nd time if you are not satisfied with your first score. But, i've heard, more than two times means colleges will frown and will start taking averages or the most consistent scores.</p>
<p>i've had this question also...i took the sat four times...twice with old in hopes of not taking new (1510,1590)...then i had to take a writing section for national merit finalist consideration so i took the new one and got 2230, wasn't happy and retook and got 2400...will this look bad?</p>
<p>Taking it 3 times is not unusual and is even expected. Four times might raise some eyebrows, but it won't hurt anything. It just isn't that big of a deal. They don't want to see little SAT machines- the hope would be that you have something better to do with your time and energy.</p>
<p>In Greene's "Making it into a Top College" (2000), it says:
"We urge you to take no more than three SAT I tests for the following reasons: ... Taking the test too many times looks as though you are obsessing about this one admissions factor. For strong students overall, most colleges will look at a set of two or three SAT I scores and take the highest math and verbal scores from among the tests. For students with five or six SAT I tests, colleges may elect to average all those scores, depriving you of your best scores."</p>
<p>This quote is reasonably vague for the natural reason that colleges can do whatever they want and it differs from college to college. Some colleges use the best one-time sitting score and never mix and match (just like the ACT scores). The main caution in this quote is for people who take it twice in freshman year, twice in sophomore year and three times in junior year.</p>
<p>So what if you took the old SAT I once? You should still only take the SAT I a total of 3 times? Or would it be ok to take the new SAT 3 times plus the old one?</p>
<p>Yea, the old SAT versus the new SAT complicates it this year. It is up to the college whether they will mix and match between SAT versions. I don't think there was ever a consensus on that. At the beginning of the cycle, the typical college admissions office was making statements to the newspapers about how they didn't know what they were going to do.</p>
<p>It does appear that most colleges are not looking at the SAT I Writing section as being any more important than the old SAT II Writing.</p>
<p>After the 4 times, did you improve...just curious to see if it was worht it
What I have read is that after the third time, it is very difficult to raise the score enough to justify taking the test, but I haven't heard that the Admin people go - egad man, he took it 4 times</p>
<p>I don't think it'll matter since twice was the old SAT. A 3rd shot at the New SAT won't be a problem. but to be honest, if I was an adcom, I wouldn't be too happy if the applicant took the SAT more than twice.</p>