<p>I never really took the PSAT seriously. I know it's just a practice test and I never really thought it meant much.</p>
<p>So I just got my results back for my sophomore year PSAT. I scored:</p>
<p>57 on critical reading
55 on mathematics
and 49 on writing skills
161 overall
I'm just wondering how good are these scores and how do they relate to a real SAT? I wanna get a score of 2000+ on my SAT. For schools I want to go to I would like to get into UVA, Virginia Tech, or JMU.</p>
<p>Thanks in advance for the help!</p>
<p>Those scores and your future score expectations suggest that you have a lot of work ahead of you. Fortunately, you have lots of time to prepare.</p>
<p>You didn’t mention whether/how you figured out that the SAT, rather than the ACT, is a better choice for you.</p>
<p>I don’t think they have a Pre act at my school so I’m bent on taking the SAT the the moment.</p>
<p>So you’re saying these scores are bad? Thanks for letting me know.</p>
<p>The score isn’t bad. It just isn’t where you want it. Your score can go up just with practicing. Reading in general and studying vocabulary in particular will also help your reading score and to some extent your writing. You can get a book to practice for the PSAT and SAT. The collegeboard blue book is the best for the SAT. Your score may go up simply by becoming familiar with the types of questions, getting faster at taking the tests, etc. You can improve by analyzing your mistakes and determining what kinds of things you need to learn in math and grammar. Best Wishes!</p>
<p>Scores aren’t good or bad in an absolute sense–the question is whether they’re good or bad for the schools you want to go to (though since they give you percentiles for the score, you should have some idea of how you did compared to other juniors). For U.Va., those scores are low. And while you can certainly go up a lot, it’s a baseline for how you were scoring in late October; it’s not something with <em>no</em> relation to how you’d score on the SAT. I wouldn’t necessarily assume you’d score higher on the SAT than the PSAT if you’ve done no work since then. That being said, if you’re motivated and willing to put in the work, you should be able to do fine.</p>
<p>Thanks for all the replies guys!</p>
<p>I guess I do have a good amount of work ahead of me. If it is low for the schools I wanna get into, I definitely need to score higher.</p>