What would you do in this situation

Parents Forum
1

<p>My daughter took SAT May 7th. Scores not what she expected. Very upset, yes I told her not a big deal(though our state Flag is minimum admit of 1800 nowadays.) Told her she could retake again. </p>

<p>Here is the sticking point. She did a tremendous amount of self prep, did all 10 practice tests in the Blue Book, did all the Barrons books, the 2400 book, the older SAT test book minus the analogies. </p>

<p>The 3 weeks before the test taking up till the week of the actual test, any practice test she took tops 2 or 3 wrong on practice tests per section. She got an 11 on her essay, yet her score translated into only getting 10 Raw score(yes 10 right out of 49) Her January test score had a lower score essay, but much better on this particular part on the MC 37 raw score) Using this as a comparison because that is the only part available at this point to directly compare.</p>

<p>She was getting 100% of the multipel choice questions right each and every time on the writing practice tests, yet a drop to 10 correct out of 49 on the actual test?. Now with all the prepping she did, her overall score was between 2100-2200 one time as high as 2280. Her January Math score was 600, May score was 520, after all the prep, she got her practice math up to 720/740, maybe 3 or 4 wrong total. </p>

<p>Critical reading January was 580/May 530. All practice tests also tops 3 or 4 wrong. She did not go into the test cocky, nor did she say she found it easy, but did say she felt much more confident in her answers. </p>

<p>She is really crushed, she put a big effort with her self prepping, it seemed she had made really big gains going by the Blue Book tests, Barrons. Don't think she could have done any more than she did. </p>

<p>Is this even conceivable, one's scores could be that off from all the practice tests, her last two full practice tests were complete with timing and everything, the 2200 was reproducible on the practice a few times, how could it happen? </p>

<p>Wondering if a hand scoring is worth looking into, to me, I know she can take it again, but to see her so defeated is hard. Especially for a kid who 2-3 months ago was pretty non chalant about the whole thing, finally take an interest in the whole thing, put in tremendous time, to get flattened.</p>

<p>Any suggestions?</p>

2

<p>Handscoring wouldn't hurt. At least then you'd know beyond all doubt what went wrong, and could revise your approach until the next time if needed. Perhaps it comes down to bubbling mistakes or test anxiety?</p>

3

<p>Does she have time to take it again? Maybe she was 'off' that day. Some don't test as well in the test setting as opposed to the 'practice' setting or maybe it was a one-off bad for her.</p>

<p>How about taking the ACT test? She might fare better on that.</p>

4

<p>I think you should definitely seek hand scoring -- it does sound kind of fishy to me, and College Board has been known to make some huge mistakes. Also, I'd suggest the Question-and-Answer Service at <a href="http://www.collegeboard.com/student/testing/sat/scores/qas.html%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.collegeboard.com/student/testing/sat/scores/qas.html&lt;/a> -- you might get a report from that faster than you will with the hand scoring. (I've heard some people complain that they have had to wait months for hand scoring results)</p>

<p>If nothing else, you will at least be able to see where your daughter went wrong... and, of course, you may discover that she didn't. </p>

<p>Also -- with all that practice, did she ever do the tests in timed fashion? Not just individual tests, but was there ever a Saturday morning where she tried sitting down at 8:00 am and using a timer to do a full sample test, including essay? If not, fatigue and test anxiety could be a major issue. The degree of prep your daughter is so thorough that I would wonder if she is over-anxious about the test. </p>

<p>So I'd say -- take a breather -- maybe sign up for both SATs and ACT in the fall, and use the summer to figure out the full story behind these test scores. I wouldn't be at all surprised if you find out that it is an issue with inaccurate scoring.</p>

5

<p>Doesn't sound right to me. (S used the blue book, and his scores on the last couple tests were right around his actual score). </p>

<p>Did she time herself correctly on the practice tests? Did she run out of time on the real test? Could she have had a "bubbling" problem? </p>

<p>It seems strange for her score to go down after so much practice. I'd get a handscore and have her retake if necessary.</p>

6

<p>Everyone else has good advice. I just wanted to add that I agree that it sounds wrong. If the score is accurate, she should try to get the Q&A service so that she can go back over it. I think she should keep her spirits up and look into taking it again.</p>

7

<p>Yes she can take it again, so thats not really a big deal. Just seeing/hearing your kid walking around saying "I can't believe it was that low from the practice ones" got to me. Tomorrow I suppose she'll feel less upset about it. She was going to do the ACT in light of the JAnuary one, but wanted to give prepping for it a fair shot first. The real issue is whether a hand scoring is even worth looking into in such a drastic difference in scores. Suppose $50 in the scheme of college costs is but a drop in the bucket to put it to rest for her. Yeah the last two tests she did timed full, albeit the essays she left off the first full timed test, but did one the second test just to see if it would make any change in the overall annoyance time/tired/brain fry. </p>

<p>Anxiety not sure, she is THE WORLDS MOST laid back type of person, so if it was anxiety,hard to say, which I did suggest maybe it was the whole caught up in the other kids stressing over it(in fact she has one friend she stayed away from the few days before cause of the other girl is/over anxious) She said no, she said "I jsut focused on it like I was sitting on my bed in my room".</p>

<p>So guess it is at least worth checking into it. Iwill look into getting the question answer service, she did that for the January one, to help her work out a plan to study.
Feel bad, I caught her earlier checking the site again looking at the scores. When she saw me she closed the screen, and she said she still can't believe it .</p>

8

<p>Maybe if you let her know that a number of people you communicated with (on CC) thought that it didn't sound right so maybe a mistake was made, and that she can take it again, it will help her to not get down on herself over it.</p>

9

<p>CBK, I think the money spent on the Q&A service and the hand scoring is worth it just to put things to rest. Since she's planning to take the ACT, I think she should go ahead with that and see what happens. She should avoid over prepping for the exam -- be sure to get plenty of rest in the days right before the exam. Also, be aware that the ACT grades its essays by different criteria than SAT (my d. had 11 on SAT writing, 7 & 8 on ACTs -- unfortunately I didn't figure out the difference until later on). </p>

<p>I do think it is possible to overdo the preparation -- whether that is a factor for your daughter, I don't know.</p>

<p>I'm betting its going to turn out that there are pencil marks that were not scanned correctly, though -- if you get the Q&A results and see a lot of unanswered questions, that would be a good indication of a marking & scanning problem.</p>

10

<p>I think after this, if she ever picked up a book again for this whole process , I would fall out of my chair :) </p>

<p>If by chance, there is/are glaring errors, like alot of empty answers,omissions,when she knows she filled out all of them what is the process then? Is it like dealing with govenment officials/insurance companies, you know 5,000 phone calls telling your story over and over again to a different person each time and getting nowhere? Or is it then when you ask for hand scoring and just wait it out? Sign up for the next one, even if the other test can take months to resolve if there are errors found? </p>

<p>The whole thing seems a bit antiquated to me, even the part about not all of the kids results being available till the 30th. You would think by now, given this test has been used for eons, 6 times or so times ayear, the process would be more streamlined and complete. </p>

<p>And to think I got into a good college/accepted with pending SAT scores, based on grades only, never opened a book to prepare, took it once, never thought twice about the entire thing. </p>

<p>Thanks for all the support, helps me to help smooth things out for her.</p>

11

<p>CBK - Add me to the list of people who suggest that something is really odd here. D#1 scored very near her three practice tests. D#2 had a "bubbling problem" on her PSAT (skipping a question in the test booklet but not skipping that line on the answer sheet) that we were able to address with several practice tests. Then she too scored very near her practice tests. </p>

<p>We reassured D#2 that oddities pop up in life sometimes, but that it's MUCH better to be a 1350 student who scores 1150 due to a silly error than to be an 1150 student who achieves that score through perfect application.</p>

<p>Good luck to you and your D.</p>

12

<p>I would get it hand-scored. This sounds too strange...</p>

13

<p>If our child supposedly went from 37/49 to 11/49, I would ask for hand scoring.</p>

14

<p>I would ask for hand score. Also since it sounds as if D is comfortable with the material, you may want to get tutor that just teaches strategies for taking the test.</p>

<p>Good Luck</p>

<p>Also why not try the ACT?</p>