<p>"My D thought she had good scores at 780 lit/ 750 USH/700 math II…until we see the number of kids on CC that have all 800s. I’m not saying her scores are “bad”. Just not top Ivy by any means. "</p>
<p>…are you serious? please don’t let the scores on CC skew your perception.</p>
<p>750 for US History is pretty good I guess.</p>
<p>I consider anything 700 or above “good”. Language tests may be the only exception, really.</p>
<p>wheatbread:
Thanks, but it’s the CC kids who ARE the competition at the top 10 schools. </p>
<p>Islander:
I would normally also call anything over 700 “good”, BUT…NOT for top 10 schools.</p>
<p>I’d call over 700 pretty much NECESSARY for those schools. I know Oxford REQUIRES a MINIMUM of 700 in 3 tests just to be “competitive”. That means EVERY applicant has AT LEAST that…AND a rockin’ application beyond that. </p>
<p>At top 10 (and I only included Oxford because they give that cut and dried formula on their website)…I’d say over 750 “good”, and 780-up very good. These schools have plenty of “perfect” applicants from which to choose. Less than that is just not competitive. </p>
<p>One more time though…for the sake of every perfectionist’s sanity…I’ve seen non-athletes get into top Ivies with one score in the 600s. The rest of the app would have to rock, but ONE score doesn’t define you. </p>
<p>Luck!</p>
<p>Let’s get real here, people. There are just not that many applicants with 750+ scores across the board. Look at the percentile ranks for the SAT Reasoning Test: only about 12,000 students nationwide get combined CR+M+W scores of 2250+ (= an average of 750+ per section), and a sizable fraction of those, probably half or more, have at least one section score below 750 but one or more higher than 750 by a large enough margin to bring the composite up to 2250. Let’s assume it’s half; so that means maybe 6,000 people nationally score 750+ on all three sections of the SAT Reasoning Test. And that, in turn, means if your score is in that elite group, you’re automatically going to be in the top 20% (or better) of the 30,000 or so applicants to Harvard. Better, actually, because some sizable fraction of that group of high scorers–again, maybe half? maybe more?—will never apply to Harvard. And of the group of 750+ across-the-board SAT I scorers who DO apply to Harvard, some sizable fraction will have two or more SAT II scores above 750—but some will have at least one score below that level.</p>
<p>For most of the SAT Subject Tests, there just aren’t that many 750+ scores. The big exception is Math II, with about 39,000 750+ scores. But there are only about 7,500 750+ scores in Lit, 13,000 in U.S. History, 2,000 in World History, 3,000 in Bio-E, 7,000 in Bio-M, 13,000 in Chemistry, and 9,000 in Physics. So the largest possible number of applicants scoring 750+ on 2 or more Subject Tests is 13,000. And remember, many, possibly most of these double 750+ Subject Test scorers will not ALSO be in the 750+ group in all three sections of the SAT Reasoning Test—and vice versa.</p>
<p>Bottom line, it’s a numbers game. Even the most selective Ivies can’t draw arbitrary lines and exclude everyone who falls below 750 in one Subject Test or one section of the Reasoning Test; if they did, they’d soon run out of qualified applicants. Between them, the top 10 national universities in the US News rankings enroll over 14,000 freshmen annually—more than the total number of applicants nationally who score 2250+ on the SAT, far more than the number who score 750+ on all three sections, and far, far more than the number who score 750+ on all three sections of the Reasoning Test AND score 750+ on two or more Subject Tests. This latter group may number as few as 2,000 or 3,000, and we know they don’t all apply to, much less enroll in, the US News top 10 national universities. </p>
<p>By the same token, though, don’t assume that if you are in that select group, you’re automatically in at a top 10 school. SAT scores, including Subject Test scores, are important, but they’re not the only factor, and not necessarily the most important factor, in college admissions. Don’t fall for claims that you won’t be competitive unless all your scores are 750+. That’s just clearly not the case, not even close. Sure, other things equal it’s better to have all 750+ scores. But plenty of kids get accepted to top schools with one or more scores in the 700-750 range, or even some below 700.</p>
<p>"wheatbread:
Thanks, but it’s the CC kids who ARE the competition at the top 10 schools. "</p>
<p>…</p>
<p>is the SAT II mandatory? i’ve never heard of it before… (sorry kinda new)</p>
<p>depends on the school</p>
<p>do you know if wharton requires it?</p>
<p>@ FURKANK: I got a 760 on the Math IIC subject test too (took it in June '09 - my only SAT II so far), and I actually think it’s a pretty solid score. It probably won’t help you, but it definitely won’t hurt you either. Percentile wise, a 760 would put you in about the 80th percentile, so it’s certainly not terrible. And, of course, if you think you can do better, you can always retake it. I’m personally retaking it in December, mainly because I think I made some stupid mistakes in June that I could have avoided (the biggest of them being that I forgot incorrect answers are worth less than unanswered questions…).</p>