My daughter, a senior, will do subject tests in November. She will be submitting the ACT. She is aiming at fairly high-level schools, ones that range between 40% to 12% acceptance rate (hoping mostly for the ones that are 12% to 25%). She is good at math at school. She did pretty well at the ACT math. My husband says the “computations” on Math 2 are difficult (so I guess time consuming would be the case, as well). She is not as good at math on standardized tests. Her tutor who has very limited tim with her, said that he, as a real expert in math, would have a hard time getting a great score on Math 2 (now perhaps he means perfect or near perfect, knowing him!), but we are now worried. How important for schools like Hopkins, Carnegie, NYU, is Math 2 or could she get by with Math 1? Any guidance so appreciated. I am not a math person at all.
Everyone here says to take Math 2, but I don’t get it. To offer my own perspective: I’m in multivariable calculus III with an A+ and scored 740 on SAT I Math section and 740 on SAT II Math Level 1 my junior year. I took a Math Level 2 practice test and it was rough. I scraped something like a 600. I was hoping I could get a better score because the curve is quite nice, but apparently not.
Also, I’m fairly sure schools know that the percentile for a 750 on Math Level 1 is much better than the percentile for a 750 on Math Level 2. They take that into account.
I think you can get by nicely on Math 1 because they’re not schools like MIT or Caltech.
Thanks so Anon. By the way, she will focus on the sciences in college, perhaps thinking medicine, but at this point, research and lots of science, so not engineering.
I took both and got 770 MI and 800 MII. MI is very similar to ACT (timing and everything), but the curve is brutal. MII is a struggle to finish in time, but if you can and know how to solve almost all the questions (I didn’t know one about complex graph transformations), you can still get a great score because the curve is way nicer. I know it’s not popular, but I recommend taking both because MI gets you in a math mindset that helps you nail MII, which is easier to score highly on in general.
The content on Math 2 is still algebra/geometry level with a bit of functions and statistics. If she is aiming for an upper level STEM program she should take Math 2. The test is a bit easier too.
I would advise that she takes Math II. Most colleges, especially those in the 12-25%, will encourage the Math II over the Math I. The percentiles don’t matter; stronger applicants take Math II, weaker applicants take Math I. That explains the percentiles. So when @Anonymoose3 says his 750 in Math I is better than a 750 in Math II, that’s not true at all.
Math I is very similar to SAT/ACT Math. The curve is brutal, and you cannot afford to make silly mistakes. On the other hand, think of Math II as the last 20 problems of ACT math (some easier, some much harder). The curve is friendly, though you need to be familiar with a lot of the advanced math.
Thanks so very much for the detailed help. She will take Math 2. She did well on ACT overall and pretty well on math (not as well as she does at school, but good). It’s a relief to hear Math 2 is more like ACT than SAT.