@Lindagaf I could see most of the value diminished without the scattergrams feature – I hope our school never changes it’s mind about lettings students access it.
With my kids attending a private high school, Naviance was extremely helpful in getting an overview. Many students apply to LACs, at least the ones in the northeast, so no problem there. Also, since the grading system was so different with no grade inflation, it was about all we had that was useful on that front. If I went by comparisons to student results as posted here on CC, or even CDS reported info, it would have been a poor predictor of my kids’ results. Comparing to their peers’ results through Naviance along with input from their college counselors was the best estimate.
@citivas our school has a total population of about 750. My son’s class was the largest in the school’s history. The problem for us was our son wasn’t a high achiever, so looking for schools based on his stats, we had limited help from Naviance.
@doschicos We have no grade inflation either and that’s exactly why our high school Naviance is really helpful. It only uses the weighted GPA but it’s easy to see the probable cut offs for most colleges. For example, I can see that everyone above a certain GPA got accepted to x college even if their SAT scores had a wide range of scores.
Although S19 isn’t applying to any Top 15 universities, our Naviance is great for those. It’s very clear where those few green dots are in a sea of red…way up in that tippy top corner. That helps kids gain perspective that even straight As in all honors and AP for four years (which happens maybe three/four times per class of 700) is only good enough maybe 10% of the time at HYPS type schools.
My kids’ school recently removed access to scattergrams, which is annoying. The most useful thing for us so far is seeing how GPAs measure up; the school grades on a 100-point scale, so it is hard to compare with the weighted 4.0 scale.
My school had Naviance and I felt as it was useful in the beginning just to have a compiled list of all the schools you can apply to and which ones are good for you based on your stats as well as your personal preferences. However besides that I didn’t find the website that useful or accurate. My school had only recently purchased Naviance and I found that some of the SAT/ACT ranges as well as the GPA ranges weren’t accurate with the most current data listed on the actual college’s website. If I’m not mistaken though the website does acknowledge that the information may not be 100% accurate and to check the college’s website so I wasn’t upset or anything, I just wish it was updated more often.
My school did have scattergrams but only for the schools that most of the students in the past had applied to. So any smaller less known schools, or even some popular selective schools,didn’t have any data because no one had applied in the past (for reference I attended a fairly large highschool that typically have graduating classes with 650+ students).
One thing I did enjoy about naviance was the scholarship tab. This tab (I’m not sure if every school has this) basically listed around 100+ local and state scholarships that you could apply too, and was updated quite regularly. These scholarships are typically for a couple hundred dollars but any money helps in my opinion.
In short I feel like the website is helpful for Freshman, Sophomores, and even Juniors who aren’t sure where to apply and want to know their general chances and compatibility to the schools they like.
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My school had Naviance and I felt as it was useful in the beginning just to have a compiled list of all the schools you > > can apply to and which ones are good for you based on your stats as well as your personal preferences.
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I agree with this @itsintheprocess
Is your child now heading off to college? Our school does this, but I assume it’s because they roll-over the system for the rising seniors that includes the class of 2017, and they don’t want those who just graduated going through their classmates’ results.
Has anyone used Naviance for ACT prep? My guidance counselor suggested I use it, but I’m not sure if it’s accredited by the ACT or that it actually holds useful information.
@equationlover I’ve personally never met or heard of anyone who used Naviance for their consulting or prep services. I don’t think they are well known for it. Doesn’t mean they aren’t good.
@EyeVeee My kids are rising seniors.
@twinsmama there are other websites you can use that provide scattergrams,but I’m nor sure how accurate they are as people just input their information into a database, which means anyone can type in random stats and say they were accepted. I still think it’s a good general site to get an idea but just be wary of some stats that seem to good to be true http://www.collegedata.com/cs/search/college/college_search_tmpl.jhtml
@itsintheprocess - ignoring accuracy, the lack of comparability of the data makes them useless for a personal assessment of potential success. The best thing about the Naviance scattergrams is that they are kids from the same system, so their successes and failures are very aligned to yours. It is far from perfect, but it is the best source of quick assessment.
@twinsmama - Maybe it’s temporary?
@EyeVeee Let’s hope so…maybe they are working on adding last year’s grads?
I have learned a few things about Naviance that could be helpful to others.
First, the GPAs in the scattergrams are “as of graduation.” Many seniors get a GPA boost senior year from AP classes, so bear that in mind when comparing the scattergram GPAs with your own end-of-junior-year GPA.
Also, if you are applying to small colleges with insufficient data points from your high school, see if your college counselor can access them for the entire county. We were able to get more data that way.
Finally, when looking at a Naviance scattergram that is very crowded and hard to read, note that you can click on the graph “key” to eliminate all the Denials so you can just see the Acceptances. I forget exactly where to click, but it’s below the graph where it tells you which color dot corellates to which status.
@prodesse does Naviance plots super scores or single seating?
@am9799: At my kids’ HS, each ACT composite went in as received. One kid took it twice and I saw the first composite in Naviance (I think we informed GC of the result) and then the new composite after he took it again (a state-required sitting at the HS). So no super-scoring here, but I imagine they would use the highest composite.
@am9799: I don’t know about the SATs. Both of my kids took it once only.
For our school it just uses one score, not a composite. I have not tested it enough to know if it’s picking the best score or the latest submitted score. Also, scores have to be student-submitted so the data for scores is probably less comprehensive than the GPA data which the school automatically maintains.
I think you really need to ask your specific school how they do it. Naviance is very customizable from school to school.