<p>Does anyone know the exact logic behind interpreting the relationship between National merit PSAT cutoff scores and average performance of students in the state, say on the SAT. As an example, Georgia and South Carolina are tied for the lowest average SAT scores in the US (also very low PSAT scores). On the other hand, the cutoff this year for the NMSQT in Georgia is 218 (8th highest ranked cutoff score inthe US), while the cutoff score in South Carolina was 212 (29th ranked). If there are so many poor performing students in Georgia, why is the PSAT cutoff so high? Is not the overall logic that roughly the same percentage of students in each state should qualify? Can one conclude that the distribution of student performance in Georgia is somehow different than in most states, i.e, the upper 1% of students in Georgia (maybe from the larger, more affluent, school districts?), are very competitive with other states, but that the lower 99% of students in Georgia are truly performing very, very, very poorly? Is there something else going on?
See state cutoff scores for the PSAT:
<a href="http://hseagle.sas.edu.sg/hscounseling/Tests/NMSCindex.htm%5B/url%5D">http://hseagle.sas.edu.sg/hscounseling/Tests/NMSCindex.htm</a></p>
<p>err.. I always thought of like those prep schools on the east coast would bring it up very much....</p>