Ugh my scores on subject tests were so bad, didn’t have any time to study, 710 and 700 on US History and Math II respectively. I know a lot of good schools who want the subject tests say either subject tests or ACT with writing. I got a 33 on my last ACT so would I really need to retake the subject tests or is the ACT good enough? The schools I want to go to are Penn, Vanderbilt, Emory, etc so would not sending in Subject tests hurt my application?
How did you study for the ACT?
Oh and all your scores are good, don’t worry! If you have time, study and retake MATH II
Penn requires either ACT or, alternatively, SAT and two subject tests, and ACT alone will work for it. It is the only one of the three colleges you list that accepts ACT in lieu of SAT and subject tests. Emory does not require subject tests but “encourages” submitting two subject tests regardless of whether you submit SAT or ACT. Vanderbilt neither requires nor recommedns subject tests but will “consider” them if you submit them (and that is regardless of whether you submpt SAT or ACT). For either Emory or Vanderbilt, your scores are liikley fine.
Your SATII scores are fine. Sure it’s not 800 but generally, anything in the 700’s is good. If you choose not to send, it wouldn’t hurt your application unless the test scores are required (aka for Penn, they are if you send the SAT)
@TheDidactic when you say send the SAT you mean they are only required if I send in my SAT scores, because I don’t plan on doing so as my ACT was much better. However from previous comments it seems as if I may have to send in all of my scores to Penn regardless of how I did.
@kaatherinee I just found previous tests online and went through those
If you’re sending the ACT, I’m pretty sure you don’t have to send Subject Tests but check the website.
@TheDidactic
Many students send Subject Tests even when they don’t have to if the scores are good – just in order to be competitive.
Look at each school’s requirements. If the ACT is sufficient there is no need to send in SATII.
If the school doesn’t require them, not sending them won’t hurt your application. However, a very high SAT II score will be impressive to any school. If you have time to study, I would go ahead and see if you can do better. It’s not going to make or break your application, but a really impressive subject test score could help you
Subject Tests certainly helped one of my students this recent admissions cycle. She had a 3.2 gpa, and I forget her ACT score (although it was good), but her SAT Subj’s helped get her into a very good public system, whereas some people with lower scores and higher grades (3.5) did not.