<p>Hey everyone. So I have a dilemma here. I'm a rising senior. I have taken the Bio and Lit SAT IIs multiple times now, and after much Bio studying I think I have finally pulled a 750+. But I'm just not good at Lit, even after a lot of studying. So I'm considering self-studying Math II (without having taken Pre-Calc before the test date) or a history.</p>
<p>I am capable of self-studying well. The only thing is, it would take me a lot of time. This summer, I have the following things I want/need to do besides potential SAT II self-studying:
-Science research internship with accompanying paper
-Intel/Siemens paper
-YES paper
-Study for USABO
-SAT math section study
-SAT vocab study
-Essay competition
-College personal statements</p>
<p>Question 1: Do Yale and Stanford's early application (non-restrictive) programs allow you to submit November SAT scores? If not, I won't be able to take any more SAT IIs anyways since I'm retaking the SAT I in October.</p>
<p>Question 2: Would it be better to have a high-600's Lit score and try to do more of these ECs, or would it be better to have a high Math II/history score and do very few of these ECs?</p>
<p>NOTE: I already have fairly good ECs, but I feel like these would make me a more competitive applicant among the top-school applicant crowd. I did not hear about any of these competitions/science things that I do now until recently.</p>
<p>Question 3: If I take another SAT II, should I do Math II or history? It would probably take about the same time to do it but I am pretty bad at Math. But I think a good Math II score could strengthen my application.</p>
<p>Sorry for this really long post, but I've been thinking this over for such a long time and I'm just at a roadblock. Thank you for any suggestions.</p>
<p>How a rising senior with science concentration hasn’t taken pre-calc is beyond me. Assuming you are going somewhere in science looking at your EC, math II is almost mandatory imo. </p>
<p>Q1. November is risky but they usually arrive on time</p>
<p>Q2. I know this is trite, but it’s all about your passion and how you demonstrate it in your app. There’s no good or bad ECs, and “strong” is very relative. It all depends on you. </p>
<p>Q3. A science concentration needs math, yes even Bio. So Math II over history for sure, but I’d advice a history too unless you wanna try to bring your lit up</p>
<p>You should definitely consider taking math II if your major focus in college is going to be science. </p>
<p>I actually think that you can accomplish everything on your list as well as study for the next SAT subject tests; it’s all about how you manage your time. I seriously doubt if you do decide to take another subject test that you will devote all of your waking hours to test preparation. Why not make a schedule so that you can do everything that you want to? In addition, I do agree with the above poster in that you do not need to try to fill a resume with EC’s that you think will impress adcoms; don’t stress yourself out so much.</p>
<p>Also, you might consider taking the ACT; they offer a September test date, so it won’t conflict with your other tests, and some schools accept the ACT in place of the SAT and SAT subject tests (it seems that a lot of people do better on the ACT anyway, so why not give it a shot if you haven’t already?).</p>
<p>Thanks for the replies. I am planning to major in Biology. I realize that science requires a strong math background. However, I have a weird upperclassmen schedule in which I took Trig in the summer before junior year and could not fit in any math classes during my junior year due to science classes.</p>
<p>@Vince: Unfortunately, studying takes me a really long time. I spent all of last Winter Break studying for Bio and Lit, half a day for each. But I will focus on choosing the ECs that matter to me and not worrying about college adcoms. I took the PLAN (similar to PSAT but for the ACT), and I did not do too well on it, whereas I did fairly well on the PSAT/SAT. So thanks for the suggestion, but I’m going to stick with the SATs.</p>