<p>I attended a parents/student college prep meeting tonight. My son attends a private college, where I have long said that longetivity is rewarded in academic and athletic endeavor over true merit, so of course I believe 100% in the virtues of standardize testing. Well at tonights meeting a few parents where upset, because their 4.00 students scored terribly low on both the ACT & SAT exams, which our school encourages our student to take early for early action applications. On the flip side of that some of those students who have the 2.8-3.3 grades managed to score in the rare air category on both exams. So, you have parents going crazy and trying to figure out how these kids are doing it with lower grades while, supposed best of the best have managed to get checked. The same thing happened in my daughter case when she was admitted to Duke,,,,,,,,people couldn't believe it, so the merits of standard testing just prove to me that schools give out gifts with grades and merit will always raise to the top when give a set of like criteria where everyone starts in the same starting ground devoid of favortism.</p>
<p>So you’re saying that SATs should be weighted higher than GPA as they are standardized? Not true. The fact that some schools “gift out grades” is checked when the guidance councilor sends them their GPA formula and list of advanced classes so they can be evaluated in the context of their school. </p>
<p>But the SAT does do a good job of weeding out the kids who A. are professional information regurgitators who have a high GPA and lack logical skills, and B. those who are too lazy to study and achieve a reasonably high score</p>
<p>This illustrates very well why the SAT isn’t going anywhere. </p>
<p>Your story doesn’t surprise me at all though. The average SAT score for a Senior with a self reported A+ average is mid 1800s. </p>
<p>My oldest had a very high SAT and very low (less than 3.0) GPA. why? He is really really smart and didn’t do his school work. He’s in college and loving it because he only has to take classes in his majors. He went in with all of his general ed requirements fulfilled through AP tests. Some kids hate high school and often, it’s the really bright ones, especially boys. </p>
<p>As for the A+ students who can’t break 2000 on the SAT? that’s the norm, especially in public schools. </p>
<p>I teach at a community college in Utah, and I see cases of grades that don’t match ACT scores all the time. I teach two sections of remedial English each semester, so I often check my students statistics. Frequently I run across students with ACT composites below 15 or so who finished high school with a GPA greater than 3.5. Sometimes their ACTs are in single digits (yes, it is possible). I keep wondering what’s gone wrong.</p>
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I’m puzzling over what is meant by “longetivity”</p>
<p>in this instance I use "longetivity in reference to the length of time that a kid has been at a particular school or in their school system…they get the benefit of the doubt based on years service or being in the system versus merit.</p>
<p>A good reason for colleges to accept AP test results for admission. It would show if that A in AP Chem was really earned. </p>