<p>My sat scores are pretty good apart from my critical reading score. I am well within range for my math and writing scores at competitive colleges, yet my cr score falls just below the 25th percentile for my dream school, dartmouth. there 25th is 670 and mine is just below that. as i said earlier, my other two sections are very high.
other parts of my application do make up for that one low score (hardest schedule, high grades, unique community service (started my own program in a neighborhood i have been volunteering since i was 12)). My recs will be stellar esp my peer rec from my best friend and teacher recs.
Basically, will one low score rule my chances out? Also, i am from a state where dartmouth does not have many students from. good old south. Thank you so much!!</p>
<p>Does it mean you will be automatically rejected? No. Does it mean you have one weak point in your application that may be considered with everything else? Yes. But whether you will be rejected or accepted depends on everything. Also, if other scores and GPA are very high, then those will help to offset any possible weakness. Nevertheless you should understand: (a) most applicants to Dartmouth won’t have that weakness; (b) most such applicants will have high grades, high scores in all three SAT sections, hard high school schedules, some wonderful ECs, and stellar recommedations, i.e., all those things you have will not make you look much different from any of the rest of those applicants; and (c) being from a state that has some but not many Dartmouth students is likely going to mean very little.</p>
<p>The same thing happened to me. I applied to Northwestern, whose 25th percentile critical reading was also 670. I received a 640. However, my other two scores were high (800 math, 720 writing) and I am attending Northwestern this fall. I made it, so you might!</p>
<p>Thank you both so much for answering! and i am interested in Northwestern as well so that is a little comforting. Our scores are pretty similar too!</p>