I have sent my application to various school and it shows in the application system all my SAT and ACT scores. I did well on the SAT, but not great on the ACT. It sent the ACT score because I requested to send it before the test, so it was free. In the application system, it says that only considers your highest one-day test score. Does this mean it will consider my highest SAT and ACT score, or just consider the better of each test and consider the one SAT score I feel good on? I feel bad about that ACT score and hope they only consider the highest SAT score.
They’ll consider whichever one is better. Don’t overthink it. What’s done is done.
Colleges uniformily assert they use the highest scores to determine admission and do not hold lower scores against you. How that actually works varies:
(a) many colleges superscore SAT tests (meaning they use the highest section scores from the combined tests (and thus you can potentially have a higher composite score than any of your tests) so if you have more than one SAT test, you need to determine your actual score that will be used if the college superscores;
(b) a number, but not all, of those same colleges that superscore the SAT also superscore the ACT, so if you have more than one ACT, you may need to determine what your superscore is;
© many colleges use that test with highest composite to determine admission and do not superscore; however, some of those have a variation/addition to that rule in that despite using that test with the highest composite, they may also consider a higher section score from another test, e.g., UIUC uses that test with the highest composite but its engineering college will also consider a higher math score from another test;
(d) when you submit both SAT and ACT, usually a college will use that test it considers to be the better one for you but determining that issue may also depend on first determining superscores for the SAT or ACT if you submitted multiple tests, because those colleges that superscore will first do that for the SAT, or the ACT if they also superscore the ACT, before determining which test score, SAT or ACT, it believes is the better;
(e) when you submit both SAT or ACT, there are actually some that superscore the combined tests, e.g., if you submit SAT and ACT to Rose Hulman, it will use for admission the higher math score from the combined tests, and the higher score between the reading/writing score of the SAT and the ACT English section (it ignores composites, and the science and reading sections of the ACT)
Bottom line: if colleges are to be believed, your lower scores will not be used against you, but determining which are actually your highest scores when you submit more than one test requires knowledge of what the colleges actually does.