@Sally_Rubenstone Do you think that the colleges will convert old scores to new scores in order to put everyone on the same playing field? Also, what about those schools that did not consider the writing score previously. My child has an old reading score just below the mid 50% for some universities, but a writing score above the mid 50% for most universities. When you convert, these two scores are combined. In this sense, do you think that those schools now have to consider the old writing score?
Some may do it the other way around … converting new scores to old ones … until they are familiar with the revised scale. But, in any case, apples will be compared with apples, and so students with the older, potentially lower scores will be at no disadvantage.
Schools that used the old writing score will see if a student already submitted it and may use it again, but my best guess is that, if they didn’t consider Writing in the past, they won’t use the old scores now, even though Writing is combined in the new scores. And, in the past, even when colleges DID consider the Writing score, it was rarely given a lot of weight unless there was a red flag (e.g., the score was unusually high or unusually low).
Son: “Dad, I got 1400!”
Dad: “Son, have a seat. Ever hear of inflation?”
Son: “Uh… no.”
Dad: “That 1400 is really 1340. And if you go back to my day when we weren’t allowed to use calculators, and we had to contend with dreaded analogies, sentence completions, quantitative comparisons, that 1400 is probably 1250.”
Son: “Why would they inflate the numbers?”
Dad: “Remember the excitement you had after you saw 1400?”
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@suzyQ7 I was wondering the same thing. Prior to the revised ACT writing score in Sept 2015, the way that the old charts broke it all down was basically to convert SAT (CR+M) to ACT © and then SAT (W) to ACT (English/Writing). So it appears that the new SAT score converters are making it so that you can continue those exact comparisons.
So right now, in order to convert new SAT (M) to ACT (M) you first need to convert New to Old SAT, then look up the percentile to which the old SAT Math score corresponds, and THEN find the ACT Math score pertaining to that percentile. It’s crazy. Hopefully someone will point out a much simpler method. In any case, it would be great to get current, detailed subscore conversions in the near future but I suspect they’ll get around to that right after providing the finalized PSAT Concordance Tables that they promised us. :))
I’m willing to the College Board a little leeway here. The SAT scores were originally conceived back when they were basically assuming they were designing an easily administered IQ test. In order to do that you need long “tails” in the distribution curve so you can accurately identify people who score two and three standard deviations away from the norm. For many reasons that idea is no longer in vogue. For one, the SAT never identified that far end of the curve terribly accurately and even to the extent it did, top schools haven’t found that information all that helpful. In each subject the top 5-6 slots (750-800) have been populated by the top 1% of students. That’s at least twice the granularity that is needed by most schools. On the ACT the top 1% populate just three slots, 34-36.
So, I think what the College Board is doing is intentionally flattening out their curve. There are only 10-20 schools in the country who really care about identifying the top 1%. There are a lot more who care about having more accurate and granular information for students on down the list, particularly the top 40% of students. My guess is that schools have realized that there is more differentiation in that range of students than had been assumed previously.
I had that exact same conversation with my D yesterday. I took the middle 50% SAT scores from the state flagship and put them through the concordance tables. Her1400 fits right in the middle. Good for her, she should be proud, but not that special.
In my day (late 70’s) 1400 was considered an “Ivy League” score.
The flattening of the SAT curve made my son bring up his idea again for another optional part of the SAT and ACT. In addition to taking the test “with writing” you could opt to take the test “with hard s**t” if you were planning on applying to those 10-20 schools in the country that care about spreading out the top 1% of students. (Caltech, et al)
Agree with @mmk2015 ! “High” SAT scores are getting to be like a participation trophy.
@Ynotgo The “hard stuff” is scoring 800s in 6 different subject tests and getting all 5’s in 16 AP exams which some kids seem to be subjecting themselves to.
The flattening of the curve doesn’t negatively impact anyone. The whole thing is relative. There is still a top 1% and they still represent . . . well, the top 1%, just like they used to. The only difference is that under the old 1600 scores that top 1% was spread from 1500-1600, now it is spread from 1530-1600. That is still more differentiation than anyone needs. And yes, my kids just spent this last week doing two AP exams and three SAT subject tests. That gives schools even more differentiation points. Even at that, schools know that scores and grades are only part of the picture.
Yes, and then those students are accused of being soulless, grade-grubbing, academic robots, and schoolsl pass them up for students who “pursued their passion.” This whole selective school admissions process is BS.
@Zinhead Agree, 100%. The SAT should be more granular at the top, period, so kids don’t have to be soulless robots getting no sleep in order to show that they are extremely strong students. I’m in favor of all school requiring all scores too- that way you can see the kid that did well on these tests after 1 or 2 sittings, vs the the grade-grubbing robots that take an endless amount of times over 2 years in order to move up a few more points.
@suzyQ7 - Can you explain what you mean by granular?
So you’re saying 1600 after 5 tries is not the same as 1600 after 1 try?
yes, actually I am, @mmk2015
Especially with superscoring, @mmk2015 .
Pardon my slowness on this topic, but when will we be able to see percentiles to match with percentiles on the old score and then see where students really line up, or will that not happen before the class of 2017 has applied to and chosen colleges? Am I missing something other than understanding of this convoluted process?
@Skyepop The “user” percentiles that the College Board includes on the reports are the percentiles you are looking for. They haven’t released a chart, but if you want to start a thread we could try to fill in a chart, at least at the upper ranges. It would look something like this:
USER PERCENTILES ONLY
Total Score / 1550 / 99th
ERW / 750 / 99th
M / 800 / 99th
Reading / 36 / 95th
Writing / 39 / 99th
Math / 40 / 99th
To get the Reading, Writing, and Math scores you have to click where it says “Show Details.”
I’ll add my scores here.
USER PERCENTILES:
Total score: 1560/99th
EWR: 760/99th
M: 800/99th
Reading: 37/96th
Writing: 39/99th
Math: 40/99th
Darn I thought I did really well. CB’s tests are already a handful and now they’re stomping on my confidence levels.
USER PERCENTILES:
Total Score: 1520/99th
ERW: 740/98th
M: 780/98th
Reading: 37/96th
Writing: 37/98th
Math: 39/98th