The colleges I’ve looked at have asked that applicant send all test results. Does that mean that they superscore? I’m assuming not, but I’m a bit confused about that stipulation. I’ve taken the ACTs three times:
March:
E 29
M 28
R 33
S 36
W 6
June:
E 28 (I studied and it went down somehow)
M 32
R 33
S 34
W 6
September results not back yet.
And they’re both composite 32s, but my superscore is a 33. I took it again because I hoped it would perform better in english and writing (I am confident that I did), but I fear that I performed worse in my usual strong subjects. I’m expecting another 32 and am wondering if, when I send them three 32s, they will see that my superscore is a 33 or, hopefully, a 34?
Just because a college asks for all scores does not mean they will superstore. If they do, they will explicitly tell you. Superscoring of the ACT is not as common as the SAT
Without knowing the colleges you are talking about, the question cannot be answered. A number of colleges superscore ACT but majority do not, and that a college requests all scores does not necessarily mean the college does superscore ACTs…
For SAT, sending all score is just the same cost as one. For ACT, you need to pay for each report, however, some schools would allow you to self report others if for a financial reason (e.g. Stanford).
As to the question as to why a college would require all scores, you get to choose which answer is right among the following answers:
A. Despite that the college claims it will not use lower scores against you, it is really lying and will consider lower scores against you.
B. Though the college claims not to use lower scores against you, it believes knowing how many times you took the tests is valuable information when comparing applicants; in other words though it won’t use the lower scores against you, it will consider the fact of how many times it took you to get the high scores you have.
C. It is an elitist college that threw a hissy fit when it learned that beginning with the March 2009 SAT test, College Board, over some colleges’ objection, was going to allow testakers to exercise score choice and not send all test scores like College Board had done in the past. Within days after learning that decision, the college protested to CB demanding that it reverse its decision, and to show College Board how a true two-year-old acts when it is throwing a temper tantrum, it immediately adopted a rule that applicants had to provide all scores, and some of them threw in the ACT to that rule just for good measure.
If you answered A, you are like many who cannot think of a meangful reason as to why a college would require all scores unless it was lying about not using lower scores against you,
If you answered B, you likely have seen the same, seemingly uniform, justification statements that the colleges which require all scores are now giving on their websites. The interesting thing about that justification is that it first appeared well over a year after the colleges adopted their anti-score choice view. Before then, the colleges offered varying reasons that were generally incomprehensible. At some point, one of them had a brainstorm and came up with the justification in B and the others quickly adopted the same excuse.
iF you answered C, you are giving the answer many of us who witnessed what actaullly happened believe is the correct answer.
@drusba Thank you for your in depth answer. I just got my new scores back and I got a 33 this time (E 31, M 30, R 36, S 35). So if they’re using my lowest against me, I would hope that the ACT reports the student survey question and shows that I didn’t bring a calculator to the first one (I can’t really salvage the English; I’m just bad at it). However, if they’re using the number of tests against me, I would hope that they consider my new writing score (which isn’t in as of yet, but I’m quite sure it has improved dramatically) as a product of the test remodel, as opposed to me trying to study for the writing because I didn’t.