<p>My son scored fairly high on the reading and writing sections, but not too high on the math. scores: Reading 770; Math 560 (1330 together) and writing 720...for a total of 2050. If he retakes to try to raise the math score, but does worse on the reading and writing, will it look bad to admissions? I know most schools take the top score of each section, but do they see all scores? he plans on majoring in the fine arts...not a math related field, if that even matters.</p>
<p>He shall retake the SAT. The colleges will see all scores but that shall not hurt your son at all.</p>
<p>retake.
its much easier to by luck bomb the test then by luck get 750 or so on it. and colleges know this.
Therefore, colleges assume if u score 500 and 700 ur score to be close to 700.
The low score wont hurt it much (or at all in some places).</p>
<p>Definitely study hard for math next time and retake....it will yield a great superscore (best 3 combined from separate sittings). At least a 2200 if he breaks 700....go for it</p>
<p>Most of the time, when I see a thread like this, I think, "Well, it depends. . ."</p>
<p>In this case, it doesn't depend. :) Your son should retake. He has two fantastic scores (congratulations to you and him!) and one sub-median score (I believe). Even if 560 is not actually below the median, it is still quite low relative to his other excellent scores. </p>
<p>In response to your specific question: Sometimes, only one or two people see the full score report. Those people record the important data (often the superscore data) somewhere prominent in the student's file. Later, if the student is right on the line between admission and rejection, it's possible that everything in the file will be scrutinized closely. But I strongly doubt that your son's W and CR scores will drop enough that he will hurt his chances. On the other hand, his current math score is definitely a negative.</p>
<p>And he's in luck! The math is easy to study for. Get a decent tutor if you like, have him do a bunch of practice problems, and let him retake. Definitely worth the trouble.</p>
<p>I agree fully about re-taking it. There is one other factor. It is common with the folks in the admissions dept. to see whether an applicant "sat on his scores" - meaning of course that he took it once and did not try to better his scores. If he sat on his scores, they view it negatively. Have him take it again; it will be superscored unless he is applying to the state schools in Calif. where it is not. Many, many kids go up in at least one subject on the SAT and down on others.....very common. The key is to get that Math section up. Good luck.</p>
<p>Here's a post about college policies of how retakes are considered: </p>