National Merit Cutoff Predictions Class of 2017

Paying for College National Merit Aid
821

Thank you for the verbal analysis @Plotinus, I can’t bring myself to do those portions. I tutor the math, so I’m forced to master that. (And I’m still pouting a bit, as I was really an expert on the old version.) You reminded me that I didn’t address the stupid error aspect on the math portion. I personally think it’s easier to mess up on the new test, only because it’s very verbally loaded, and you can’t just run with the math. You always have to go back and answer the verbal question. You know, the one that is actually being asked. I am very, very good at running with the math, and find this requires more of my concentration. Disclaimer: I’ve only to date done practice problems while watching TV, and would like to believe that I’d make fewer careless errors in a more typical setting.

I’ve read that the math is streamlined a bit to be more practical, and I can see why that might be desirable. And most questions are very “real world” in that regard. However, I’m still a bit flummoxed by the “passport to advanced math” questions, as they seem to be a bit more obscure. On the whole though, I think a very solid algebra 1 student could earn a very respectable score on this test.

822

Might I add that the reading section and grammar were painfully ambiguous for me even though I received a 1600 on both sections on the october SAT.

823

@PAMom21 There were 8 grid in questions, 4 each in calculator and in non-calc. section.
DS agrees that math questions were more “verbally loaded.” DS missed couple questions by not answering the “actual” question although he usually tends to make scuh careless mistakes.
He got 750 (37.5 - 3 wrong) and 2 yrs ago got 76 (~2 w).

824

Thanks for sharing your impressions and analysis, @Plotinus. I listened to the CB webinar for GCs over the weekend and it struck me how closely aligned the new PSAT/SAT suites are with Common Core. It is almost scary. Because I have a junior this year, I had forgotten that they were rolling out a PSAT9 and PSAT10 version, too. All of them are building on each other. Also, the guidance counselors will be able to filter school-wide score reports that show success and failure at an item-level and thus, in a way, at a teacher-level. I don’t remember the precise phrase but it was something like “why is everybody getting such and such wrong.”

825

Thank you for the grid in info @payn4ward! I’m surprised this student scored as well as he did (upper 70’s) without answering any of those questions. Of course that might be the national percentiles versus the user ones. I hate so many unknowns.

826

If you use total state population as a proxy for the number of eligible juniors, and you plot the total state population vs. the number of NMSF per state, then you’ll see that the ratio is similar, but not exact from state-to-state (ignore the noisy data of the small states). This is probably the consequence of using an inaccurate proxy and partly the consequence of the choice of SI cutoff.

827

@PAMom21 My D3 scored a 740 in math by missing 4. That concords to a 74 - 76. If he missed eight due to not answering grid-in I highly doubt he got the equivalent of upper 70’s.

828

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@MALABARCOAST2014 someone on this or one of the related threads was advised by National Merit Scholarship Corp. NOT to use the concordance tables to figure out SI cutoffs. Not sure why that was advised; however, it might be the case that they tend to be more accurate for median than high-end scores.

829

I think the reading will be harder for some because you will not be able to get 13 of the questions right by brute force. By that, I mean memorizing lots of vocabulary words. In the past, even if you were just alright at comprehension, you could do pretty well IF you memorized tons of words. The Frederick Douglas passage on the new test was HARD.

830

The concordance charts are a mess since they don’t even agree with each other. The percentile charts - well, I’m not sure what to think about them. I like them better, but I am just not sure about the accuracy. When I compared the percentiles from the 2014 Understanding you Score to the 2015 report I noticed that the percentiles for scores in ALL THREE AREAS in 10th grade vs 11th grade scores were quite different in the two reports. The Sophomores and Juniors did nearly the exact same - at the top end of the scale - in 2015 but in 2014 there was a bigger difference between the two class years (which would be what you would expect).

831

@Mamelot, my fault for not being clear. I meant upper 70’s in percentiles. His ability was above average overall, but more typical for his course placement. I wouldn’t have expected him to score that well with a -8 right from the bat.

And @micgeaux, the math equivalent to your “brute force” thought it probably the fact that you can’t use your TI-84 to work around gaps in your own math familiarity.

832

Testmaster is predicting the commended cutoff to be 210 because testmasters has used only concordance in their analysis. They are not using the SI Tables on understanding PSAT 2015 (Page 11). Lets look at the states who got less than 210 last year and how many SF they had:

202-209
Wyoming - 202 cutoff - 26 SF
North Dakota - 202 cutoff - 35 SF
South Dakota - 202 cutoff - 41 SF
West Virginia - 202 cutoff - 88 SF
Arkansas - 204 cutoff - 149 SF
Montana - 204 cutoff - 51 SF
Alaska - 206 cutoff - 39 SF
Utah - 206 cutoff - 151 SF
Idaho - 208 cutoff - 80 SF
Iowa - 208 cutoff - 176 SF
New Mexico - 208 cutoff - 84 SF
Oklahoma - 208 cutoff - 173 SF
Wisconsin- 208 cutoff - 348 SF

SubTotal 2014 SF from 202 - 209: 1441

SI 209 (2014):
Alabama - 209 cutoff - 227 SF
Mississippi- 209 cutoff - 136 SF
Missouri- 209 cutoff - 328 SF
Nebraska- 209 cutoff - 98 SF

Total 2014: 202-209 SF who came under 210 cutoff = 2230

The concordance tables, and testmasters, are saying that 2230 kids scored high enough to meet the 2015 commended cutoff of 210. Maybe, because the test is easier (simpler, more straight forward, in line with these states ‘common core’ perhaps?) these low scoring states of the past have done better this year. If we look at the percentiles here: https://collegereadiness.collegeboard.org/pdf/2015-psat-nmsqt-understanding-scores.pdf, that 210 would be well into the 99%ile. Does that mean that these percentiles are wrong (as others have been saying) or that the all 50,000 commended kids are from the 99% group? Is this probable? Likely not - because with 1.6million test takers, that math does not work.

I do think that its quite possible that these ‘bottom’ 1441 students (202-209 last year) could quite possiblely have done a lot better on this test because it was easier, more straight forward, and in line with ‘common core’. So the bottom did better - which is what the CB wanted. Not sure how that bodes for the top.

833

My kids (one in private school & 1 in public - school has a high performing segment) hated the reading & along with many students on social media that day joked about the Frederick Douglass and Herminia pieces They also felt the questions were linked so if you missed one you were likely to miss more. They had not tried to really “prep” for this PSAT though - NY adopted the common core but there has been huge backlash. So, not sure how the state has fared. It may be for the students who really prepped and had more test taking experience under their belts that it was easier. I don’t get the sense though that students everywhere thought so or did very well. Also, what is the curve based upon for each section - should that take into account how easy or hard each part was? My older son aced math - but I see it was a pretty nice curve so it does not show as much. Will be helpful if we can get data & feedback from GCs!

834

@DoyleB :

" I would hazard a guess that CB doesn’t provide SI percentile tables based on the current year’s students BECAUSE they provide too much information. You would know the commended number within a point, and could accurately estimate each state’s cutoff, likely within a point as well. That’s something NMSC would prefer to put out in their press releases later on instead. "

I AGREE 100%. This answers the questions we’ve been asking “why don’t they use actual SI’s since they have them and its so easy”. Because if they did, we’d know the NMS secret sauce and we’d be able to figure out commended and likely state cutoffs VERY EASILY. NMS would not want this. So CB probably agreed to use other data because of this. But I have a hard time swallowing that they would use really inaccurate/skewed SI data…but its possible.

835

@MALABARCOAST2014, yes yes, at least I found one agree with me (post #819)

From my post http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/sat-act-tests-test-preparation/1816872-psat-discussion-thread-2015-p275.html, page 275 and post #4125 (date 1/15/2016).

I agree with you, since you stated “These percentiles correspond with the traditional percentile cutoffs in these respective high scoring states and thus provide the most useful standard for estimating the thresholds come fall”

836

My DS got 4 wrong on Reading - 3 of them in a row related to the Frederick Douglas passage. He was not happy with that passage.

837

My DS also missed 2 of the Frederick Douglas questions.

838

DS said he read F. Douglass passage during class (although he missed a bunch of questions.)
Maybe that’s why his school has so many high scorers!
If it was sliding scale cutoff -12, his school alone would have ten times more NMSFs than last year’s.
That’s why I think the cutoff will stay about the same with commended around 200 - 205.
Any other school read F. Douglass in class ? :wink:

839

@suzyQ7
“I do think that its quite possible that these ‘bottom’ 1441 students (202-209 last year) could quite possiblely have done a lot better on this test because it was easier, more straight forward, and in line with ‘common core’. So the bottom did better - which is what the CB wanted. Not sure how that bodes for the top.”

But not all of these “bottom” states teach common core. Ours doesn’t. All I have is anecdotal evidence, but the “smart kids” I know, including my D, did not do well on this test.

840

Since Applerouth published their analysis recently – https://www.■■■■■■■■■■■■■■/blog/2016/01/14/can-you-trust-your-psat-score/
& it has been commented about on this thread, I thought we might look back at their post on October 21 - after the PSAT of Oct. 14:
https://www.■■■■■■■■■■■■■■/blog/2015/10/21/new-psat-captures-the-hearts-and-memes-of-todays-teens/

Students comments were gathered ----
“The Critical Reading passages were more challenging than on previous PSATs, reflecting the College Board’s increased commitment to enhanced textual complexity. Like the four SAT practice tests made available by the College Board, this PSAT boasted one particularly hard passage. In this case, the higher difficulty passage was a Frederick Douglass speech from 1852.”

“We heard complaints about the 60-minute length of the Reading test and the difficulty of pacing oneself on this now-longer reading section. Others found that the charts, tables, and graphs questions–the College Board’s foray into ACT Science-like content–were significantly harder on this PSAT than those on the provided sample test.”

Math

The two Math sections on the PSAT elicited different student reactions. The vast majority of students had concerns about section 3, the no-calculator Math section. The new test allows only 25 minutes for the 17 non-calculator math items. Several students wrote in online forums that they had more time to fill in their personal information than they had to take the no-calculator Math section. This section demanded much harder hand calculations than had appeared on the SAT or PSAT practice tests, making things particularly difficult for students who are accustomed to relying heavily on their calculators. Long division, multiplication and division of multiple decimals proved to be very time-intensive for many students. Additionally, some of the more complex algebra items surprised and challenged students.

Writing was said to be similar to practice materials & the past tests.

Also from the Applerouth website – “When scores are returned, many students will want to know if they are within the range of National Merit Scholarship consideration. This year, the National Merit cutoff scores will be based on a new Selection Index, which can be calculated by adding up the three section scores (each on a scale of 8-38) and multiplying the sum by 2. This gives a maximum possible Selection score of 228, a number relatively close to the familiar 240 point maximum scaled score of the old PSAT. National Merit cutoff scores will vary by state, and we expect the scores to range from the high 180s to the low 210s, based on the performance of students in each state., based on the performance of students in each state.”

Read more here - students reactions after the PSAT: https://www.■■■■■■■■■■■■■■/blog/2015/10/21/new-psat-captures-the-hearts-and-memes-of-todays-teens/

So Applerouth had predicted a lowering of scores for the cut offs along the lines that Prep Scholar did - but now they seem to be changing their minds based on some data they are seeing. But the feedback they got after the test is also “real” & may be the curves reflect some of the challenges students had in reading & math (little curve in writing).