<p>I’ve grown up in an exam-focused country, where students take three centralised exams (after 6th grade, 10th grade, and 12th grade) I definitely agree with the utility of such exams to compare across a broad swathe of pupils. </p>
<p>So, LauraN, I kind of disagree with your decrying of the OP’s feeling that the 690 is bad. Because it just plain isn’t very good, and the OP didn’t master the subject. He wasn’t as good as the other people who got 750, 770, etc. </p>
<p>It wasn’t missing a question because of wrong shading, or feeling sick. The raw score needed to get an 700 is 60 [out of 80], which means the maximum number of correct questions is 64. Missing 16 questions…</p>
<p>But since the OP has taken so many other subjects, and MIT only considers the two top scores, then it doesn’t matter.</p>