<p>Well the PSAT is in less than a week and I am not doing so well on the practice tests so I have 2 questions:</p>
<p>1) What is the score needed for commended?</p>
<p>2) How important is being a finalist for competitive college?</p>
<p>I wanna know too since I am an international student and therefore not qualified for the NH...</p>
<p>The National Merit Commended cutoff can vary a little from year to year. I think it was 200 this year, 202 a few years ago.</p>
<p>National Merit Finalist is a very prestigiouos accomplishment. However, not making it is not a big deal as far as applying to competitive college is concern. Your GPA, SAT and/or ACT scores, how hard is your course load, your EC's and Community Services, your recommendation, and assay taking together are more important. Just work hard and try your best.</p>
<p>If you get a 180 and then a 2300/35 on your SAT/ACT, Harvard's not gonna care or even know.</p>
<p>I've heard of people getting a higher score on the actual SAT than they do on the PSAT adding a 0. I didn't do great on the PSAT practice test I took this weekend, but I think just taking a practice test was good to know what it is like. Now I know that on Wednesday not to actually read the long passages because you usually have to go back in and read it anyways.</p>
<p>DD did not realize the importance of it, and was under the weather that day. She scored 187 on PSAT but has a 33 on ACT. I doubt the 187 is going to be a factor in admissions.</p>
<p>PSAT is not used by colleges in the admission process. Since PSAT is usually taken in Oct. of the Junior year, most people will score higher in SAT when taken later in their junior or senior year. Only for a very small percentage of students, PSAT is important because of the National Merit Scholarship competition. But the most important reason to take the PSAT is to allow stdents to know their strength and weakness so they can better prepare for the SAT.</p>
<p>yeah i took the psat's last year and got a 209 and just last may i took the actual sat's for the first time and got a 2300 so it varies a lot. i think psat's can only work in your favor because colleges wont care if you do bad on them but if you do well on them you get national merit.</p>
<p>What score did you get on your practice PSAT dr10? I took it also. I thought it was really easy compared to the sophmore PSAT I took last year. </p>
<p>What does everyone else think?</p>
<p>i got a 1850 as a sohpomore last year. i just took the practice psat and got 2230. i didnt even look at the practice test last year so i cant compare. i think a lot of it has to do w/ luck, esp on the CR when i can usually narrow it down to two.</p>
<p>There are only two purposes for the PSAT - practice for the SAT and National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test. Unless you are a National Merit Semi-Finalist, a National Merit Commended Scholar or a National Achievement Scholar, the colleges never see your PSAT scores.</p>
<p>Some schools throw a lot of money at National Merit scholars. Some schools put very little to no importance on National Merit. It can help to do well on the PSAT and does not hurt to do poorly on the PSAT. The more important tests are the SAT and the ACT. Even if you do well on the PSAT, you have to validate that score on the SAT in order to get National Merit Finalist. And the schools use the SAT and/or ACT for admissions decisions, not the PSAT. So, relax.</p>
<p>Well, my brother got a full ride to University of Texas A&M plus some spending money if he applied ED, put it as his #1 choice, and kept a 3.7 GPA because he made semifinalist. he turned it down though. I still think that was stupid....</p>
<p>National Merit's importance is based solely on your college plans. The University of Tulsa is my dream school. So, If I advance to finalist, then I will have a full-ride. That would be really nice!</p>
<p>Good luck!</p>
<p>Typically the awards are conditioned on obtaining finalist status. And, some schools are very generous to National Merit Finalists. But, those schools are often very generous to other well-qualified students as well.</p>
<p>FWIW PSAT is sometimes a factor in other awards. In MD it's used (along with GPA) to determine state Distinguished Scholars. They receive 3,000/yr if they attend any private of public instate school. The cutoff is lower than for National Merit.</p>
<p>Some schools are very competitive and want to take as many NM scholars as possible. It'll give you the competitive edge over your classmates that are not semi-finalists.</p>
<p>the score is used as a cutoff in Junior year for RSI applicants....
....since the SAT scores around here seem to start high and
reach higher....to perfection the National Merit by itself does
not hold much value for applicants from my school to
the top 10 schools</p>
<p>To second MD_Mom, the PSAT is used for other purposes. Another example is corporate scholarships where PSAT score is used as the threshold to determine which children of employees can compete further.</p>
<p>PSAT score is used to determine National Hispanic Scholar and National Achievement Scholars, too.</p>
<p>National Merit is the easiest way to get full ride scholarships, period.</p>