SAT in 8th grade for college app

<p>Hello, my friend's brother took the SAT in October for CTY and got a very good score, and he wants to use it for college. According to some people CB automatically cancels all your 7th and 8th grade scores or something in high school, but how does one circumvent that on the website? Don't say "he can always do better in high school!" or something because those scores are exemplary (I won't post them) and he probably won't retake the SAT.</p>

<p>The scores only are discarded if 1) the student is younger than 13 when taking the test, and 2) the student does not request that the scores be retained before the end of the school year.</p>

<p>He probably will need to retake the SAT, anyway, unless he plans to go to college early. I hear conflicting opinions on this, but many people say that the schools will want to see more recent scores. It would be best for him to, in a year or two, contact some schools that are of interest and see how they feel about older vs. newer scores.</p>

<p>He should take the SAT again. Colleges only look at the SAT scores applicants take in high school.</p>

<p>Don’t worry, he will do even better.</p>

<p>Can college hypothetically look at scores from middle school assuming they’re from the 2300+ range? (2330)</p>

<p>Yes. Again, assuming your friend is not younger than thirteen, those scores will be retained, and when he logs on to his College Board account three years from now, they still will be sitting there. I had my child’s 7th/8th-grade scores retained, and they are available to send to schools.</p>

<p>Hypothetically yes, but you might want to contact schools to see if they regard middle school scores differently from high school scores.</p>

<p>Your friend’s brother should make an official request to the College Board to retain his current scores.</p>

<p>There are some cases where colleges want students to retake the SAT after a certain number of years have elapsed–however, that normally applies to adult students who have been out of high school and working, so have not been in an academic setting. Your friend’s brother will have been continuously in an academic setting since taking the SAT. Also, this almost never kicks in unless the scores are more than 5 years old. If your friend’s brother is in 8th grade, no worries–it won’t be more than 5 years. If in 7th grade, I think the continuous academic setting analysis applies.</p>

<p>Oh, duh, I just reread the title of your thread–he is in 8th grade, so I think there is no problem with respect to the scores being too old. But he needs to officially ask CB to retain the SAT scores, or they will be erased.</p>

<p>He should just take it again. Colleges will favor a high school score. Besides, if he did well now, he’ll do better in high school.</p>

<p>I think the biggest question is why he took the SAT in the eighth grade at all…</p>

<p>My D took them to qualify for special programs and was awarded a one course scholarship from a local college that she used this year. We did not retain them, as they were outstanding for a 7th grader, but she did score higher as a junior. Sounds like in OP’s example, it may not be possible to score much higher.</p>

<p>^#10, mirandastern, the OP stated that his friend’s brother took the SAT to qualify for CTY, the Center for Talented Youth, which operates out of Johns Hopkins. CTY has summer programs, online programs, family academic programs including educational travel, and other offerings. CTY is especially valuable for strong students whose local educational environment cannot really meet their needs.</p>

<p>There are similar programs in other areas of the country, run by Northwestern, Duke, and presumably other schools in the regions I’m not familiar with.</p>

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<p>Many students take them through academic talent search programs like NUMATS, CTY, TIPS, etc. The scores allow them to qualify to attend summer programs for gifted students – some programs are offered through the talent search programs, but there are also other programs like the Davidson Institute for Talent Development THINK program that they can be used for. If the scores are especially high and the student is young (under 13) they can quality for some special services through some of those programs as well.</p>

<p>Regarding the OP’s question, the person with the high score probably should request that the College Board retain the score.</p>

<p>You can call them- their number is online. But if they aren’t over 2300, it’s best not to keep them, because the colleges won’t be especially impressed.</p>

<p>tomatox1 said 2330 in post #4. I don’t see any reason for a student to retake a 2330 scored in 8th grade.</p>

<p>There are a handful of kids each year who are younger than 9th grade who essentially max out their ACT or SAT scores. They should retain these scores and there is not a lot of reason for them to have to take these tests again, they have maxed out. They will continue to learn as they progress in school, but those learnings will not be reflected in higher tests scores. These kids are truly the six sigma kids of the nation and if you do have the chance to interact with them, you will truly be amazed at the wonderful minds that they have been blessed with.</p>

<p>In 6th grade I scored a 36 on the English part of my ACT, reasonably high in Reading, but abysmally in Science. Would you recommend sending those scores when I apply to college? Is there any way just to send my 6th grade English score? <em>gets scissors and official score report out</em></p>

<p>Well, some colleges “superscore” the ACT. So if that score were retained, it could be useful there. But you will have to re-take the ACT again anyway to bring up the rest of your score… and if you can get a 36 in 6th grade, you very likely will do the same in 11th.</p>

<p>sg12909, a 2330 in eighth grade actually is extremely impressive – less common by far than a 2400 in eleventh or twelfth grade. I expect that that is the highest score obtained by an eighth-grader this year.</p>