<p>@LauraN: </p>
<p>Well honestly, the thing that is wrong with our educational system are people who try to encourage students by telling them how “good” they are doing, and then discouraging those students who are “perfectionists” from being perfectionist. What’s wrong with someone who feels that a 690 or such is inadequate? More power to them - I think you should be jealous of someone who has the drive and the mindset for that, someone who doesn’t care that an 86% is an 86% when they feel that they should be doing better, or that they need to do better. That’s the reason our public school systems are so massively behind, while we have some of the best universities in the world. Those people who say an 86% is good enough aren’t the ones who end up being the people who DON’T realise that the people who strive for 100% are the ones making the private universities, the private high schools with higher standards. They’re not there to make everyone feel good; they’re there to have their students learn, regardless. A student that feels that an 86% is good enough will always remain mediocre compared to those people who endeavour to surpass that.</p>
<p>Even if your rationale is that it’s just a test score, that means nothing. This crap about people with “bad test days” is just plain stupid. Is that what you’re going to tell your boss when you fail to complete a task correctly? “I’m having a bad day” or “I just couldn’t remember how to do it right - I could get it right the next time.” ?? Absolutely not. A test score is a means a of self-evaluation, and those people trying to get 800s are trying to gauge their improvement until they reach the maximum measured skill level. Honestly, colleges probably should focus much more on objective measurements such as SAT or ACT scores simply because skills are objective - colleges and universities are there for people to learn, not to judge your character as a person. Your potential for success can only be judged by your concrete accomplishments, be those test scores or a high-profile event that was planned and executed. </p>
<p>Summarised, you shouldn’t criticise people for nitpicking at their college applications. They’re trying to be the best, and they want colleges to see that as well, as they so often fail to do. If more students acted as such, maybe we wouldn’t have just the Ivy League and a handful of top technical universities… maybe ALL universities would have standards raised to the point where high schools would have to raise their standards to where the US could become internationally competitive in education again.</p>