We’re hopeful S22 will be a semi-finalist. He is taking the SAT at school in a couple months. Can he go ahead and send the score using the free send then? Or is too early since he’s 2022?
Also, do they just send that score or do they send all of them? He has a 1520 from November, so that for sure would work. Is there any reason he shouldn’t send? He’s wondering if he has a really bad day and gets a low score, if that will keep him from being a finalist next year.
Thanks.
Did you check with the College Board? They must list which scores are applicable. Also, since you are using SAT instead of the PSAT scores have you checked what the process is?
You could always call National Merit Scholarship Corporation and ask if they’ll keep the score on file until next year if you send it now. This year they didn’t take confirming scores at all but I would guess they’ll go back to taking them for next year’s class. I don’t believe a low score would hurt him if he subsequently scores high enough, but again I would call NMSC and ask them directly.
Also, if he did take the PSAT in Nov/Jan that will be the score that counts.
Yes, agree. I’m assuming the student had a high PSAT score this year and anticipates qualifying for NMSF based on that. The SAT would be the confirming score that NMSC typically requires for NMF consideration.
I was saying something else. Some kids weren’t able to take the PSAT and will use the SAT as their metric for the NMF (not as a confirming score).
There are rules around how this can be done. Many/some will have taken the PSAT and might want to use the SAT score instead. That can’t be done.
Sorry for the confusion.
When you send scores from College Board, they send all scores. Assuming the high score was from the fall of Sophomore year or later, it would serve as a qualifying score, if they are even required next year.
I don’t see the downside of an unexpectedly low score as there is in using free sends to potentially test-optional colleges, so I’d go ahead and send it using the free send.
Sorry I wasn’t more clear. He took the PSAT in October and is well over previous cut offs for our state. He also took the November 2020 SAT and that is high enough to be a confirming score. He has to take the SAT again in April as a school day test from the state requirement.
I tried googling for the info and looking at College Board and had no luck figuring it out. But it sounds like he’s set to use the free send in April and everything will go. He tests well, so it would be unusual to have a bad day and low score, but you never know.
This exactly what S20 did. He used his free send from March of his junior year. Once he was notified of being NMSF, he called just to double check that his scored was correctly received.