<p>gigidaisy</p>
<p>Are SAT IIs required by your colleges? If not, I don't see any reason to do any more testing. Your current ACT is very high and your SAT is very good. Retakes don't always yield higher scores. I would, if I were you, send the ACT as an additional score to the schools where you've already sent the SAT.</p>
<p><a href="%5Bb%5Dtokenadult%5B/b%5D%20wrote:">quote</a> It may not matter at all. </p>
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<p>Exactly where in that posting can one find evidence that "it may not matter at all" whether the SAT or ACT is sent, or whether there is a discrepancy between the SAT and ACT scores?</p>
<p>broken link in post 22.</p>
<p>Not to worry. If you missed the first 40 repetitions, just wait a few minutes and another one will be on its way.</p>
<p>DS got a 34 on ACT (1520 conversion they say; somehow I don't believe it), and 1430 on SAT, clearly not as good. We sent all scores for two reasons: two scores over 700, one only 690 seemed pretty good and something colleges would want to know and it seemed weird for an East Coast kid not to have taken SAT's. I would feel differently from other parts of the country where kids don't automatically take SAT's. BTW, among his excellent AP scores was a 2 in Latin. We sent this too rather than have AdComs wonder why he didn't take this AP exam. (I read a transcript of AdCom meeting in which such questions were voiced.) We let it all hang out. Result was gratifying.</p>
<p>BTW -- he did prep for SAT and NONE for ACT. In fact he balked at even taking ACT, but caved when he discovered friends were. Go figure.</p>
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<p>Congratulations. There shouldn't be any harm in sending two different brands of test scores to a college your child desires to attend. The colleges have their rules--possibly internal rules that may be different from some equivalency charts shown on the Web--for relating SAT I scores and ACT scores. In general, colleges have a policy of "no harm, no foul" in evaluating multiple test scores: the student gains the benefit of the student's best test scores in comparison to other students applying to the same college (who likewise get the benefit of their best test scores). Thanks for sharing your story, which should help to relieve the OP's understandable parental concern about this issue.</p>
<p>We spent a little extra $$ sending all scores including AP scores. They were very good--not perfect--and we went for full disclosure. He never repeated a test, but that probably makes no difference if the highest scores are transcribed by administrative assistants.</p>
<p>OT--I never felt it mattered that I did ALL the phone contacts with admissions because my son HATES to talk on the phone to strangers and was usually in school or at a rehearsal during business hours. I could be wrong, but I doubt it hurt his chances.</p>
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My daughter had a 28 ACT. The year my daughter was accepted, the mid-50% score range for Barnard ACTs was 29 - 31.</p>
<p>If your question is: are your daughter's test scores good enough for Barnard, the answer is obviously yes -- they put her in the top 25 percentile of Barnard applicants. </p>
<p>If your question is -- will the above 75th% mark ACT score automatically get your daughter in to Barnard -- then the answer is no. It won't. The year Barnard accepted my d. they turned away many students with higher test scores. </p>
<p>I thought Barnard was a reach for my daughter -- but in hindsight, knowing more about the admission processes and the backgrounds of some of her classmates, I think it was a match. My daughter's interests and personality were an excellent fit for Barnard. The question was never whether her test scores would get her in, it was whether the scores were bad enough to keep her out. </p>
<p>My advice at this point would be to stop worrying about the tests -- your d's ACT is good enough to avoid being rejected by any college in the country. But a high test score by itself is not going to get a student into any of the most competitive schools, because they see plenty of high scoring students. They will mark down the score on the file and then essentially forget about it and focus on other elements of her application. </p>
<p>The question for each college is going to be: what personal qualities, what interests, what accomplishments set your daughter apart and will help each build its desired entering class for 2008? I personally have a hard time seeing the nexus between Barnard, CMU & Michigan Business, so I am wondering whether your daughter has really spent enough time learning about the colleges on her list so that she can target the ones that will best meet her needs.</p>
<p>Can someone tell me the truth about why there is all this stress about college admissions?
My ex went to Johns Hopkins, then went to medical school elsewhere. He only applied to the elsewhere school. He used to moan that he should have just gone to the state university and then apply to med school, he would have fewer college debts. So he determined to send our oldest 3 (all gifted) to the state university, where they all partied and got 2.7 GPAs. One is a math major, and this won't affect her, the other couldn't get into law school (naturally). The third just got a job after graduation.
Now I have another child coming along, also gifted.<br>
Does it really matter for grad school where you attend as an undergrad?
And how does a child decide what college to attend? How do you determine her "needs"?
I would appreciate any help. I know I have a lot of kids, but I hope you don't hold it against me. They are all good citizens and try to be helpful to others.</p>
<p>First of all, hopefully none of us <em>will</em> "hold it against you." Goodness, why should anyone do so? :)</p>
<p>From teaching the gifted, I know that they need especially to be motivated, often. Paradoxically, sometimes they do not perform when placed in too easy an environment. I don't know about the 2.7; perhaps the setting did figure in to performance, depending on the level of achievement of peers, the expectations of profs given what they've come to receive from the student body there. </p>
<p>But as to needs, I would hope the student(s) would be forthcoming about this. Parents, GC's, and private counselors should all count on the student to articulate desires, needs. Sometimes adults can help steer that, or consider & advise with regard to aspects minimized by the student. (Such as possibly being more aware of how the student is affected by distraction, by peer performance, based on their history.) Hopefully, this all involves dialogue as a family. I always think it's important for parents to provide reality checks to the nevertheless valid dreams. The student may be projecting a preference not based on personality traits (for example, a student overwhelmed by large environments, large classes, or uncomfortable in the reverse), but based on a popular choice of current peers. (The colleges that are currently "hot." Etc.) Merely offering an adult opinion does not prevent them from going their own way. This is why I believe in having these conversations really early on, before fall of senior year. By that last year of high school, the seniors often get swept up in pressures & competition generated from classmates, & are not responding to any genuine inner voices. </p>
<p>In general, academic and personal needs, in their various categories, should all be considered, within the budget limits realizable or projected by the family, including any post-graduate acdemic needs. If you know a student will be truly unhappy in a rural location, or without nearby conveniences (including airports, if that's a concern), that's something to be upfront about.</p>
<p>In the case of one of my D's, I think location is absolutely crucial to her doing well in college -- not a specific location, but only a certain type of location. While she's trying to focus on both an ideal location & an ideal academic setting, I'm more realistic, & it's a struggle. Since she's stated that location is paramount (& since that's true from her history), I would prefer her to sacrifice "ideal" academics for the location, if it comes down to such a choice, because it is likely to make a huge difference in performance, not to mention possible post-graduate decisions. Nevertheless, I may lose the battle. I can only encourage, that's all.</p>
<p>readingfanatic -- when your kids "all partied and got 2.7 GPAs" it had nothing to do with the fact that they were at a state university and nothing to do with the fact that they were labeled "gifted" -- it has everything to do with their degree of internal motivation and attitude. So it doesn't matter if kid #4 is "gifted" -- it matters whether that kid is a worker/studier or a partier.</p>
<p>I wonder how "partying and getting D's" at the state school was related to academic rigor or lack thereof. In other words, would a top elite private school have generated an environment where studying would have been the default mode instead of partying, which seems to be more of the default mode at large state schools? </p>
<p>Put another way: Some kids will do well anywhere, but others are affected by their surroundings. Would the $200,000 private elite school have provided $120,000 of additional value in academic rigor versus the $80,000 state schooL?</p>
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<p>For the record, until a few months ago, a few schools CLEARLY favored the SAT. Actually some of them favored it so much -or disfavored the ACT-- that they did NOT accept the ACT. Schools falling in such categories were Princeton, Wake Forest, and Harvey Mudd.</p>
<p>This said, in today's environment, all of the differences do not amount to much at all. It IS a good idea to try both tests (a few times if needed) and then decide which one is better for YOUR individual case. </p>
<p>The fact that the ACT might be a superior test (which it is absolutely NOT) is not important. For what it is worth, the often repeated claim that the ACT tests a "different" kind of knowledge is as true as there are different forms of English ... on the test. </p>
<p>The bottom line is this: check each and every school for their policies on the ACT sub-tests and SAT Subject Tests. You may find some nice exploitable loopholes --such as the asinine decision of schools of accepting the ACT science test as a substitute for a science Subject Test. </p>
<p>All the availability of choice is GOOD for the students. Picking the scenario that fits the individual conditions the best is all what students and families should care about. The debate about which one is better is better left alone.</p>