Good point @suzy100. Some schools superstore one but not the other, and some do not superscore at all.
3 is pretty wrong too: "there is a non-trivial difference between a 34, 35, and 36"???
No school in the world is going to reject you because you got “only” C34 rather than C35 or C36. A college will reject you for other reasons.
Average, ECs, level of class difficulty, strength of college application, Essays, etc. will make or break you at that point.
SAT and ACT scores are rarely evaluated without context at selective colleges. I know applicants that didn’t get in because their scores were less, whether its 34 vs. 36 or 2250 vs 2380. I agree that those are not big differences, but colleges see them as significant especially so they can look better in the rankings and in general feel better about themselves that they’re admitting a smarter class. Then your score is evaluated depending on major, family background, URM etc. An Asian applying to Stanford with a 34/2250 will have to take it again, they’ll be competing with other Asians who have 35/2350 and 36/2400, and 800 on the SAT2s. I don’t want to get into whether that’s a good policy or not (imo, colleges should be free to admit who they want), but that’s reality. Getting into non-STEM majors at Berkeley is easier than their EECS program, so a 32 may be ok for say a humanities/social science major, it won’t be for EECS.
@mmk2015 Well, I got news for you. There is a difference between a 34 and a perfect score. Just look at Stanford’s website:
http://admission.stanford.edu/basics/selection/profile.html
People with 800s on SAT reading, grammar, and math had significantly higher acceptance rates than people with ~750 (around a 34). Moreover, 31% of sat perfect scorers got accepted to Stanford last year. Do you really think people with a 34 have a 31% acceptance rate?
If we were talking about a 35 vs 36, your argument would be correct. But a 36 is a much higher achievement than a 34.
Call Stanford. I’m pretty sure they will tell you something different.
People who score C36 have other things going for them.
@KiaAfzali Not disagreeing, but curious where you sourced these numbers (e.g. 31% admit rate for perfect SATs) for the composite SAT scores, given the data you linked?
Also, is there specific information regarding the admit rate (or perhaps score distribution) for a 750 score or are you assuming that the 700-799 range rate is a sufficiently accurate substitute?
I would say DONT do it. My “unhooked” Asian Male kid who did not cure cancer nor win Nobel nor is a underwater pianist was accepted to UPenn and CMU and Georgia Tech and USCal on a 34 ACT.
Work on drafting spectacular common app essays and “Why” college essays
You probably should focus on something else rather than retake it for a higher score.
31%? You totally misinterpreted those numbers in that Stanford profile. No where in that document does it break down the Perfect Scorers and their acceptance rate, not the way you stated.
31% is not correct.
I believe using the 700-799 admit rate to represent the 750 admit rate is a bit dicey as well. Assuming the number of 700 scorers is noticeably great than the number of 799 scorers… the overall admit rate of 700-799 will be more weighted toward the rate of the lower scorers… so using the 700-799 rate to represent the admit rate for 750 scorers should be a noticeable underestimate. (I’m not an expert on distributions but I think we’d all agree to this at least in a general sense. It would be interesting to find out what the numbers really do say for 750). Given the distortion of the landscape that these tables create, it’s a bit disappointing the institution chose to present the data this way.
I’d vote to enjoy your 34 and work to improve other things.
@CU123 @chippedtoof
“69 percent of Stanford’s applicants over the past five years with SATs of 2400—the highest score possible—didn’t get in”
https://alumni.stanford.edu/get/page/magazine/article/?article_id=66225
I know this is supposed to mean perfect SATs are not everything, but it also means that 31% of perfect scorers got in.
I’m not saying that there is a difference between top scores. If you had a 1580 SAT or a 35 ACT I would discourage retaking. However, a lot of people get 34s, especially with superscoring. I know a dozen kids at my school with a 34 or higher. If you’re up for retaking it, I would urge you to do it.
@KiaAfzali thank you for the reference for the 31%
This other viewpoint has been cited here on CC before: http://mitadmissions.org/blogs/entry/whats_the_big_deal_about_402
I contend that this is the philosophy of 90% of the top schools. Of course there are more 34s than 35/36, but nothing shows the adcoms care. There is very little data, including the Stanford charts, that a 34 vs 35 vs 36 are differentiated in truly meaningful fashion. Most academic index formulations I’ve been exposed to would give the same grade for all three scores. At this point, a better essay/EC achievement/GPA/etc may bear better fruit.
The blog was written in 2004, things have changed as the noble laureate Bob Dylan wrote. The five or so kids that got into MIT from a local high school all had at least 2300. Now that school is predominantly Asian, and they wouldn’t apply without at least a 2300 (35-ish). Like I said, context matters, an Asian would have to retake the ACT at 34, that’s below average for the people they’ll be compared with, i.e other Asians. In today’s scores, an Asian would take it again if they got a 1500.
@chippedtoof I agree that working on other things will be more helpful than improving a 34. However, I still believe that improving a score of 34 will be beneficial.
My kid (ORM) got into Stanford with 33 ACT and 3.9 gpa but his intended area was non STEM, and his sub ACT scores in reading and writing were 35. I told my kid his test score was just fine for top schools, and he focus on other areas.
A 34 is 99.04 percentile (EDIT: link was chopped - guess you have to google for source). Hard to say “lots of kids get a 34.” Prepscholar says 18,746 got a 34 but but that’s compared to 25,031 33s. Sure only a couple thousand scored 36 but you can chase a 36 all day. I think there is a bit of luck between a 34 and 36 for most - you are talking a couple questions.
I agree common data sets are not helpful at this level. I think 30-36 is lumped together. I might be off a little but it’s a huge jump. 700-800 on SAT isn’t as helpful as breaks at 50’s but it’s better than the ACT breakdown.