<p>The PSAT NMSF qualifying score for our state dropped this year, and my son squeaked by, surprising us in September. He hadn't taken the SAT because he did great on the ACT. Since you have to take the SAT to be NMF, he did that in November. He gets those scores tomorrow.</p>
<p>Late registration deadline for the Dec SAT? Today. Argghhh.</p>
<p>I don't expect him to need to take the SAT again for NMF--he needs a 2000 to qualify, and his ACT score equals a 2330 SAT. But what if.....</p>
<p>Another $70 down the drain, just in case. This is completely deliberate on the CollegeBoard's part. Colleges receive his scores today, but not us: we have to wait until tomorrow.</p>
<p>^ Check the portals at the colleges that he applied to. A lot of the times they are loaded right away.</p>
<p>Call College Board - you should be able to get the scores through the website. We got my daughter’s on a Sunday afternoon just about 2 weeks before we got the envelope. </p>
<p>Since your son was close on PSAT scoring, he could have taken the SAT at any point during his junior year…just in case.</p>
<p>This isn’t the College Board’s fault. It was your son’s and you decisions not to take the SAT earlier.</p>
<p>Thanks, MichiganGeorgia and Irishmom2–I will try that.</p>
<p>Thumper1, are you saying the College Board does not deliberately schedule exam registration dates like this, to increase registration?</p>
<p>I’m saying that your student could have taken the SAT in the spring of junior year, and that would have avoided this last minute thing. The college board is not at fault. You made a decision to delay taking the SAT…and that was your choice. A junior year first testing would have give you very sufficient time to retake in September…or even in June of junior year.</p>
<p>I’m not sure why you are blaming the college board when it was your decision to NOT take the SAT at an earlier date.</p>
<p>Hmmm. Well 1) we didn’t think he was NMSF and he scored so well on the ACT that he moved on to study for the SAT 2’s. You know, the general consensus on testing here on CC is that you do well and you move on to work on other things, rather than perseverate. It never crossed my mind that the required score might drop and he might qualify.
2) We didn’t even know you had to take the SAT to be NMSF. We didn’t find out until they handed him the packet at the end of September. He was already taking the SAT2 in Oct, so that made the SAT have to be November and/or December. </p>
<p>So, even if I had known that he might qualify for NMSF, I didn’t know he then had to take the SAT. It wasn’t a decision to delay the SAT; it was a belief that he had already checked the " standardized test" box. I’m certainly sorry I did not know those things about NMSF. I read here a lot and haven’t seen these facts–maybe most everyone here takes the SAT as a matter of course. </p>
<p>So you can blame me for ignorance, but not a deliberate delay.</p>
<p>Probably I am frustrated because, in contrast, when he got his ACT score and wanted to try to raise his writing score, he could register right then to take the next ACT test. So the consumer experience has differed–the ACT raised consumer expectations that the SAT failed to match.</p>
<p><<<
I don’t expect him to need to take the SAT again for NMF–he needs a 2000 to qualify, and his ACT score equals a 2330 SAT. But what if…
<<<</p>
<p>Actually, he needs about a 1960…and it’s not M+CR+W It is M+CR+ (Writing multiple choice subscore X 10 )</p>
<p>It is highly unlikely that someone who scored the equivalent of a 2330 on the the ACT (34? 35?) not to be able to score the needed score.</p>
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<p>he doesn’t need the SAT to be NMSF. He needs the SAT to become a NMF</p>
<p>Unless money is really tight in your family, it seems like a no-brainer to sign up for the Dec test just in case. If you’re low-income, there should have been waivers for free SAT testing. </p>
<p>This should be a heads up to any parents of juniors whose PSATs were within a few points of the recent cutoff…take the SAT.</p>
<p>Thanks for all the specifics, mom2collegekids and I agree with your conclusions!</p>