What is the lowest New SAT score you would submit?

Colleges and Universities A-Z Wesleyan University
1

Given that Wesleyan is test optional, in your opinion (and I know most of us on this site are students or parents, not admission officers, just making our best guess based on the experiences of those we have heard about), what is the lowest new SAT score an unhooked applicant should submit? I know their website recommends not to submit under the 25th percentile, but I am wondering if an unhooked applicant’s should be substantially higher than that? Are scores between the 40th and 75th percentiles good to submit, because then they will not wonder if your scores are lower?

2

1540+ would be a strong score and make you competitive (for stats, at least - keep in mind that unless you have noteworthy ECs to match your academic strength, your GPA/test scores won’t mean much, especially for competitive schools like Wesleyan). I’d say the lowest should probably be around a 1500.

Also, just wanted to let you know that (apparently) for test optional schools there’s no penalty for not submitting test scores. They don’t look at it as “this person didn’t submit test scores, so they must have been bad”. Instead, they evaluate the parts of the application they do have to determine your strengths. They’re looking at what you give them, not what you omit.

3

I don’t know for students in US, but there is a rule of thumb that international students in Asia should match their SAT/ACT scores up to the top 25% (75th percentile).

While I don’t know whether this is true, I too tried my best in getting the score up to the 75th percentile and submitted an SAT score around 2200 with CR 740 to Wesleyan and received an acceptance (I did have a ‘hook’ though. Top 5% of the graduating class, publishing a book and a research paper on an international journal…etc). Although I think I still would have sent my score even if it had been as low as 2100, I would like to add that my 2200 SAT was considered ‘LOW’ compared to my peers (People in Asia view 2250+ SAT as “okay” enough score to aim for a top college).

I think you should try for an 2200 in old SAT standard (at least) if you are an unhooked applicant. Just remember that SAT score isn’t everything :smiley: