I haven’t done the best in my English classes, but I was wondering if getting an 800 on the SAT literature subject test would help demonstrate my skills in this area. I was wondering whether they looked at this test more than they would for say, the English section of the regular SAT or AP English Literature.
If you haven’t done well in your English classes, you most likely won’t do well on the Lit subject test. The test is notoriously difficult and nearly impossible to prepare for (bc it tests your reading comprehension ability which is built over the years). If you’ve scored high on the SAT reading section, you will probably do well on the lit test (I had a 790 reading and got a 780 lit); however, if you don’t have a high reading score, you will do significantly worse on the lit test (a friend with a 700 reading got a 630 lit). So, unless you are already scoring high on reading, you probably won’t be able to score in the high 700s on lit.
Echoing post #1 that it is very hard to prepare for the literature subject test, my child with a 760 in the SAT reading, scored 730 twice in the literature subject tests, with intensive self-studying between tests, which evidently did not help.
No, a 1 hour subject test isn’t going to “make up for” a course grade earned over a full year of study in the eyes of an admissions officer.
Grades hold the most weight (considering course rigor), then SAT/ACT, then Subject Tests. Some AO’s have told me AP tests are on par with Subject Test, others have told me they don’t even look at AP scores.
Sure, getting an 800 would be a positive for an application. But it won’t mitigate coursework. And, as noted, it’s not easy to do