<p>Thanks for all the good info; I’m catching up now! We’ve been checking into all the fantastic scholarships available for NM and are now praying for at least a one point drop in Texas - my son’s score is 218.</p>
<p>Question: are the cutoff scores ever “leaked” early?</p>
<p>
I have never seen this information posted early on CC. Indeed the NMSC never publishes an official list of cutoff scores, although they will tell you the cutoff score for a state if you call them after the official press-release in mid-September. </p>
<p>However, high schools are notified in late August about their qualifiers (and sometimes tell their qualifiers what the cutoff score is). There is a media “embargo” on this information until the mid-September press release, which some high schools misinterpret as a requirement that they not communicate qualifiers to anyone until that date. Other high schools notify their qualifiers very soon after receiving the information, so across the nation some qualifiers learn of their status weeks before others.</p>
<p>We here on CC compile, as fast as we can, a list of cutoffs based either on inference (reported qualifying and non-qualifying scores for each state) or on the bits of information obtained from the NMSC.</p>
<p>If anyone has the info, I’m sure it will be here! You guys are great!</p>
<p>Clapuma, my son scored a 213 on the 2011 PSAT in Missouri. Last year’s cutoff was 213; the 3 prior ones were 210,211, and 213. I found on the PSAT website that the number of test-takers in MO dropped in 2011. However, I don’t know how to find the number of high-scoring students (ie 70-70?). You mention that a decrease in the number of high-scoring test-takers would portend a drop in the cutoff. Do you think Missouri’s cutoff will drop, increase, or stay the same?</p>
<p>Just a correction to my recent post: I meant “high-scoring students (ie 70-80)”, not “70-70”. Also, if anybody know whether Missouri had an increase or a decrease in high-scoring test-takers for the 2011 test, can you please let me know? Thanks!</p>
<p>Jennieling, Your situation is similar to mine in TX, my son also scored last year’s cut off in our state. By the way, there were fewer top scoring students in MO too, so you can be reasonably certain, the cutoff will be coming down.</p>
<p>Perazziman,thanks so much for the information! I am really glad to hear that Missouri had fewer high-scoring students this year (ie the 2011 test)! Where did you find this info? I found the means for each year’s test by state (ie the mean CR, mean writing, mean math, and the means by gender) , but where do you find the number in the high-scoring (70-80) range? Or are you just assuming that if the sum of the means (ie sum of CR mean, writing mean, and math mean) comes down, that means that the number of high-scorers also must have decreased? Also, congrats to your son for such a high score!</p>
<p>You can find it by state here</p>
<p>[College-Bound</a> Juniors 2011 - PSAT/NMSQT](<a href=“http://professionals.collegeboard.com/data-reports-research/psat/cb-jr-soph/juniors]College-Bound”>SAT Suite of Assessments – Reports | College Board)</p>
<p>Look for the group scoring in the 75 to 80 range starting around page 5 for the three subsections, then look for the prior year from the link on that same web page. Then see if it went up or down. At least that is one way to do it.</p>
<p>But its inexact at best. you only see the 3 subsection scores, not the total test scores. Also, some states require looking at the next group (70 to 75) to get to the cutoff number. You can interpolate to see the true number of above-the-cutoff numbers, but I am not sure how accurate you really get. And the number of test takers seems to have a big impact as well.</p>
<p>I guess what I am saying is there is no real way to know for sure short of waiting for the official scores to come out. I hope all these states go down for the next cutoffs, but I suspect some states will go up, and some will go down.</p>
<p>Thanks a lot for explaining this! Now I see the data–can’t believe I missed it. I’m pretty new at this. In 2011 the number of high scorers and the percent of high scorers was lower than in 2010 in every category (ie CR- 75-80, CR 70-74; writing- 75-80; writing 70-74 and math 75-80—only in one area, math 70-74, did it not go down). Also, the total number of test-takers in MO decreased in 2011 compared with 2010. Sounds like this would all point to the cutoff being the same or lower, right? Thanks for your help!</p>
<p>Yes, like you said it is still a guess, because we do not know the state by state combined scores.</p>
<p>Jennieling - The number of test takers did not change much, but the top scores look a lot closer to 2 years ago (cutoff was 210) than last years scores. So I agree with you that it looks like same or lower for MO.</p>
<p>I hope it comes out good for you!</p>
<p>Question: are the cutoff scores ever “leaked” early?</p>
<p>The year that my older son made NMSF, he got a NMF scholarship offer in the mail in mid August. The colleges know who has made it at that point. Colleges aren’t supposed to send mailers out that early, but I don’t know if anything is in place to really stop them</p>
<p>Arghh I got a 222 in CA.
Apparently last years cut off for CA was a 221. If I do not qualify I will be a sad child :(</p>
<p>Mom2collegekid: do you mean they sent it out in the summer before entering senior year?</p>
<p>Not sure I follow the statistics here, but do I read all this to say that there is a predicted drop in the Texas cutoff score? Or is that just wishful thinking?</p>
<p>As far as I can tell, any comments on lower cutoffs this year is just a guess. There was a large increase in cutoff scores this past year and they might go back down but that’s just speculation. We won’t know until August / September.</p>
<p>In my opinion its likely a pretty good prediction. As others have pointed out, they see numbers that would lead you to predict the score would not go up again and likely may go down. However, the truth of the matter is that even though they might well be exactly right, you won’t know for sure till the scores start showing up on this board in the fall.</p>
<p>No way around the waiting that I know of.</p>
<p>The guess is not that the cut off will go down because it went up last year. For example, the guess is that cut off will rise in Pennsylvana this year, inspite of the rise last year.</p>
<p>Projections that cutoff scores will go down are premised on the fact that they were historically high in many states last year and that the “high-scorer” cutoff this year, which is based on the national pool, went down from 202 to 200 this year.</p>
<p>Some here look at the per-state score data released by the College Board, compare it to the previous years, and make inferences about how cut-offs will fare. This is something of a black art, however, as only per-section data, not combined scores, are released by the College Board. In addition quotas for each state vary year-to-year based on high school graduation rates. </p>
<p>In addition, this might be particularly unpredictable this year because, if I recall correctly, the way of measuring graduation rates was just standardized across all states in this past year. This might make a noticeable difference in how quotas are allocated this year and, thus, affect cut-off scores.</p>
<p>(A quick search found, for example, these articles:</p>
<p>AL: <a href=“http://blog.al.com/breaking/2012/05/fewer_alabama_high_school_stud.html[/url]”>Fewer Alabama high school students graduating under new formula; Huntsville city only 66 percent - al.com;
NJ: <a href=“http://www.pressofatlanticcity.com/news/breaking/high-school-graduation-rates-have-dropped-statewide-under-new-formula/article_051bca92-93d9-11e1-a20c-001a4bcf887a.html[/url]”>http://www.pressofatlanticcity.com/news/breaking/high-school-graduation-rates-have-dropped-statewide-under-new-formula/article_051bca92-93d9-11e1-a20c-001a4bcf887a.html</a>
NM: <a href=“http://www.therepublic.com/view/story/ef039e03b4084e2582dd5498feaee34e/NM--Graduation-Rates/[/url]”>http://www.therepublic.com/view/story/ef039e03b4084e2582dd5498feaee34e/NM--Graduation-Rates/</a></p>
<p>As the last article states the reason for moving to the “cohort” method the article mentions is that new federal regulations have required it. States that have already been using this method will be relatively unaffected, but those that don’t might see their NMSF quotas change. I should add that I am uncertain as to what data the NMSC uses to allocate NMSF slots.)</p>
<p>More research - here is an explanation of the change as it affects GA:
<a href=“Redirect Notice”>Redirect Notice;
<p>
</p>
<p>It appears that, in the new method, students that take longer than four years to graduate don’t count in the calculation.</p>