During my daughter’s interview at a certain school, we were told they wanted to see over 1400 on the SAT and a 34 or higher on the ACT. I asked the representative if I had heard that correctly and she said those were their target scores for each test.
@cavitee. Wow.
Ditto. There’s a school that noticed something.
We have heard similar numbers during an interview - 1450 or 33
1450 or 33 is in line with the current concordance tables. I suspect that after tomorrow, those numbers will adjust more in line with what @Cavitee reports.
I think 1450 or 33 is in line with the older version of concordance table.
The current concordance table indicates 1450 as 32.
Hopefully the new table will adjust at least to the older numbers tomorrow.
Yup, yup…thanks for correcting. I have too many tables open!!
My totally unscientific impression is that
1480=34, 1440=33, 1390=32
But I’m betting it’ll be
1500=34, 1450=33, 1400=32.
My guess is that even the statistical evidence we are seeing won’t change the original concordance table much. It will defeat the objective of the College Board to make an “easier” test and I can’t imagine the ACT will enjoy the label of the less challenging test.
Somehow numbers will be manipulated to look like the first projection. So the odds of a 1450 going from a 31 to a 33 seem pretty remote. Probably accurate but remote.
The plus is - it appears most schools disregarded the old concordance after a few cycles, they’ll more than likely do the same with the new one
But the collegeboard wants to appear scientific and if colleges disregard its concordance then it looks foolish.
I agree with @Cavitee. And as long as the score ranges are properly recorded by the colleges, which I think they will be, I guess it doesn’t really matter in the end. People will know, to use the @Cavitee example, that even though the 1450 equates to a 31 on the chart, it will look better (more like a 33ish) in the eyes of the admissions re reviewing their application.
Let’s see tomorrow. But I’m not thinking we will see much of a change either…I hope I’m wrong.
If the schools are using these scores the way they say they do for “holistic” admissions, the only real question is which score in either test corresponds with a high likelihood of being able to thrive in the college’s academic environment. After that, it shouldn’t matter because other factors should then take over. On the other hand, if the colleges are looking at the scores as a way to rank the candidates that is a completely different matter.
I would guess there is some degree of ranking, but I’m not sure. But maybe they only compare SAT takers with SAT takers and ACT with ACT. That might explain the range differences we are already seeing.
I know that people are talking about percentiles a lot, but are these actually an accurate method to use when comparing scores? There are 7 states (and DC) that require the SAT and there are 14 states that require the ACT. I did some calculations and it turns out that roughly 389,000 students graduated in 2017 from the states requiring the SAT and 609,000 students graduated in 2017 from states requiring the ACT.
I think that it is fair to say that students who are forced to take the SAT/ACT to graduate and don’t plan to go to a four-year college will tend to do worse than the average student who takes the SAT/ACT. In other words, when a state requires its graduates to take one of the tests, it is causing more students to take this test than normally would and brings up the percentiles for kids scoring around the top.
Think of it like this: if you have a score at the 94% percentile and then the number of people taking the test scoring below you doubles while the number of people scoring at or above you stays the same, your percentile will increase to about 97%.
Since considerably more (57% more) students are being forced to take the ACT than the SAT, ACT scores of higher percentiles may be easier to achieve than SAT scores of a similar percentile. I think that this is why most people on this site seem to do a bit better on the ACT and why ACT scores seem to concord a bit higher than SAT scores in general.
Some data from Wesleyan on admitted students for classes 2021 vs 2022 show ACT scores rising while SAT scores stay about the same
ACT median 33 for 2021 and 34 for 2022
ACT mid 50 32- 34 for 2021 and 32-35 for 2022
SAT median math for 2021 760 and 760 for 2022
SAT mid 50 math 720-790 for 2021 and 730-790 for 2022
SAT median verbal 750 for 2021 and 740 for 2022
SAT mid 50 verbal 720-770 for 2021 and 710-760 for 2022
Maybe the redesigned SAT produces higher scores at the lower end of the range, but once you get into the 700 range, there is not an advantage
@kimclan1 This is an interesting question, something I noticed just the other day. In the 2016 Understanding Scores:
My understanding was always that User percentile is college-bound students whereas Nationally Representative Sample (denoted as “National” on score reports and on the tables) is everyone and ought to account for school-day tests, school graduation reqs, etc. (Nationally Representative Sample percentiles still based on the 2015 study.) However, in the 2017 Understanding Scores:
I wonder whether the deletion of college-bound from the User definition may be an effort to mask something in the data. Thoughts, anyone? (I’m annoyed with myself that I didn’t notice the deletion of college bound. To find “SAT Understanding Scores 2016,” just google with quotes and one or more sites will turn up, not at CB.)
@wisteria100 This is definitely true. At the 25th percentile of the scores I tracked from about 35 well-regarded schools, the median jump from the 16-17 CDS to the 17-18 CDS (I realize this is not the same set of years you compared with Wesleyan, but illustrates the redesign point) for the combined Math & EBRW was 50 points. At the 50th percentile the median jump was 35 points. But by the time you get to the 75th percentile, the median jump was just 10 points. The 75th percentile for most of these schools was 1400+, so, yeah, there’s just a limit to how much the score can improve.
^^ Interesting. Also, the user percentile tables have shifted a bit between the two years. In 2016, 99+ was at a 1550. In 2017, it’s at a 1530. National percentiles haven’t changed, at least at that high level. My D17 took the inaugural test in March 2016 and pretty much all on the CC threads weren’t even looking at the “Nationally Representative” numbers. Both were based on a “research study” but at least User was more comparable since it was supposed to represent college-bound testers (and not everyone in the class of 2017). Now it appears that they are re-defining “Users” to be everyone who took the prior year’s test (regardless of whether they are “college-bound”?). While it’s good to base at least ONE set of percentages on real test data, are they really considering that everyone should qualify as “User”, especially given that they are hooked into the college grad standard market?
When does “Understanding Scores 2018” arrive?
Edit: regarding comment #735
So, on what website do we expect to find this new chart tomorrow?
Wouldn’t they be on both CB and ACT websites?