How do top scorers on tests fail to gain admission to top schools?

[tokenadult]

Another thread recently posted here on the Parents Forum, and LOTS of threads posted on the forums devoted to standardized tests, prompt me to ask this question: how is it that some high school students with very high admissions test scores, even scores at the peak of the standard scoring scale, don't gain admission to the college of their choice? What kept those students out of the college? How is it that even a student with a 2400 SAT and a 36 ACT can't be 100 percent sure of being admitted to the top colleges in the United States?

What do you advise that high school students bear in mind for preparing a college application besides test scores? What are cases you know of when a student with high scores was rebuffed by a college that appears to favor high test scores? What aspects of suitability for one or another college are not captured by admission test scores?

For reference, here are score distributions for the ACT and SAT for class of 2006. New score distributions for class of 2007 should be posted on the Web in the next month or so.

http://www.act.org/news/data/06/pdf/National2006.pdf

(table 2.1)

http://www.collegeboard.com/prod_dow...siteCR_M_W.pdf

[marite]

Tokenadult:

For a lot of students, the "college of their choice" is not necessarily among the most selective (and by that, I do not mean the most excellent, but the ones into which admission is most difficult).

Great GPAs can be obtained without taking very challenging courses, or courses that are as challenging as those taken by some other student who does not have as high a GPA (for example taking post AP-courses). Since the SAT math test does not test much beyond Algebra II and Geometry, a high SAT-math test score will not be as impressive as some other measure of math achievement.
Knowing only GPAs and board scores gives us only a very limited perspective on the academic achievements of students. And that's before we take into account recs, essays, ECs and other elements of an application.

[franglish]

There are so very many criteria that go into each student's application and his/her acceptance. When you look at all of the data which state that thousands and thousands of well-qualified applicants are rejected, that must include students with excellent test scores.

It's a good thing that scores are not the only criteria that are included in the process, because there has been so much reported about the bias of these tests, and we obviously wouldn't want students who are only good test takers. Extra curriculum activities, essays, teacher rec letters, transcripts, etc. etc. etc. ad infinitum (ad nauseum?) make up the entire package. Even if 19,000 or 20,000 applications are all superlative, each college only has room for a tiny fraction of its applicants. That has to mean that highly qualified students will get rejected. There have even been posts on this site that indicate excellent students have (shudder) been rejected from ALL OF THEIR CHOICES. I know, it boggles the brain, but it has been known to happen. This is a terrible time for these youngsters and the competition is only supposed to get worse for a few years. Baby boomlet...

What that means is that each student must build his/her list very carefully, including a wide range of schools all of which s/he needs to be able to imagine attending. There is really no such thing as a sure fire safety school any longer. Really, good luck. This too shall pass!

[ashcourt]

Last year I attended a presentation given by an admission's officer at a top ten LAC. He stated that in 2005 the admission's committee rejected over 200 applicants with perfect SAT scores. I came to appreciate this school's philosophy of looking at the total student, and emphasizing high school course selection and performance, character, and service to community over standardized test scores.

[ugen64]

I'm a student - I got a 2330 cumulative on the SAT. it only measures your test-taking ability - not anything useful (like intelligence, or study skills, or a passion for learning, good time management, etc.). that's why getting a great score on the SAT doesn't guarantee getting into a good college. colleges are looking for the character traits I mentioned - not "how well does this student know how to guess when he narrows a 'last 3rd' sentence completion question down to 3 choices".

in the end, getting a 2400 (or a 2390, or whatever) only says one thing - "this student is good at taking the SAT". he/she knows all the tricks, when to guess, when to skip questions, which vocab words are most likely to come up, etc. and I think that's why many colleges, if not all, are very reluctant to admit an otherwise non-exceptional student based on 1 exceptional standardized test score.

that's just my opinion.

[Marian]

At Cornell University, which is the college my daughter will be attending, the admissions officers tell students on every available occasion that their high school transcript -- both the choice of courses and the grades shown on the transcript -- is by far the most important criterion in admissions decisions. Test scores are much lower down the list.

There were a lot of Cornell applicants in my daughter's class. Their results (admission or rejection) reflected what the admissions officer said. Those with very high grades and not-so-spectacular test scores (within the range suitable for Cornell) were much more likely than those with extraordinary test scores and mediocre grades to be admitted. (I can't judge the importance of curricular choices because my daughter and her friends were all in an IB program, with an essentially predetermined curriculum.)

Beyond that, I think students need to devote some attention to all of the other factors that are considered in the college admissions process. Do they have some sort of extracurricular activities, preferably with something more than just routine club membership in at least one of them? Or, alternatively, have they held down a job or two (just as good as ECs, as far as I can tell)? (To get into a Cornell-level school, you do not have to have cured cancer, but you should not have spent all of your high school years just watching TV, either.) Have they managed to make a good impression on at least two teachers, so that they can get decent recommendations? Have they written reasonably coherent answers to the essay questions on the applications? If they are applying for a specialized program, have they done something to demonstrate an interest in that area?

Of course, Cornell is one step down from what your 2400/36 people are probably shooting for. At the very, very top, the situation may be different.

[ses]

I also think that with the ability of the middle and upper middle classes to pay for their children to take SAT tutoring classes, and the prevalence of this practice, the high SAT scores that some kids have are not necessarily a result of their innate intelligence, but rather of A LOT of coaching.

SATs scores are just a number. There is not correlation between the SAT and the level of intellectual curiosity, kindness, integrity or individual promise that any given student has.

[molliebatmit]

I think that in many cases, applicants who are otherwise very competitive for top schools can be derailed by negative teacher and counselor recommendations. Even a valedictorian with a 2400 won't be accepted at a top school if his or her teacher recommendations indicate that he/she is arrogant, doesn't want to help others, doesn't deal well with failure, etc.

[tokenadult]

He stated that in 2005 the admission's committee rejected over 200 applicants with perfect SAT scores.

An admission committee that did this must have rejected most of the highest-scoring applicants in its pool, as "perfect SAT scores" only number in the hundreds per high school graduating class,

http://www.collegeboard.com/prod_dow...siteCR_M_W.pdf

and not all perfect scorers apply to the same colleges. Such a statement surely illustrates that some colleges, at least, are looking for something other than peak test scores.

[Northstarmom]

If the top scorer also has top grades and dream school is a place like CalTech, Cooper Union or their instate public university, those select students primarily based on grades and scores, so the top scorer will probably get into their dream school.

If the top scorer's dream school is a place like HPYS, then they'll need to bring much more to the table than scores and even grades because most of the applicants at places like HPYS have great scores and grades. What makes HPYS the colleges that they are is the campus environment -- the hundreds of student-run organizations on any subject under the sun -- the amazing peer interaction beteen students who not only are smart enough to handle the curriculum, but they also are passionate enough about other interests that they are spending lots of time doing things like community service, theater, music -- just for fun even if those things have nothing to do with their majors.

Consequently, the 2400 scorer who has no strong ECs indicating a high level of leadership, self motivation and talent (ECs can range from research, writing, church activities, a job, athletics, etc.) would not be a welcome addition at the kind of schools that I mentioned. They want students who'll do more than study.

Finally, if the high scoring and high grade student has something in their background or application that indicates they're unethical or completely selfish (such as having a career goal to make as much money as possible so they can live a luxurious life), racist, sexist, homophobic, etc., they aren't going to get the admission nod. The top colleges don't want to admit students who will end up being alum who are embarassments.

[oldfort]

One school actually told my D's counselor that she was not a good fit for the school. They ended up taking 2 kids that had lower GPAs and test scores than my D. It was disappointing initially, but in hind sight we think they made the right decision. The school got the impression from reading our D's essays. I think it is true that it takes more than GPAs and test scores. Colleges look for fit and what each student will bring to the community.

[marite]

But against whom the so-called top scorers are being compared? 800s vs. 750s? If the 800s have nothing more to show than high SAT scores, while the 750s have got a slew of accomplishments such as high AIME scores, and various kinds of academic awards, I seriously doubt that Caltech would choose the 800 over the 750 scorers. I'm not even talking about violin-playing ability, just academics.

[Northstarmom]

A few years ago, CalTech's entire freshman class had gotten an 800 on one of the math SAT IIs. If CalTech factored in ECs as much as places like HPYS do, I doubt that they would have had an entire class with 800s on that math test.

Students with stellar stats also can get rejected because they blew off their applications or interviews because they assumed their stats made them shoo-ins.

I remember one student with stellar stats who blew off their interview with me. They already had an Ivy admit, and possibly assumed they were a shoo-in at my school or maybe they applied to my college only because their parents made them.

No matter what questions I asked in the interview, the student replied with one word or one-sentence answers. When I asked the student if there was anything that I hadn't asked that they'd like to talk about, the student said a flat no, then got up to end the interview. Normally, I interview students for about an hour. This interview lasted half that time. The student ended up being rejected.

Coincidentally, later that spring, a student whom I know happened to mention the name of the student who was rejected by my college, and said that the rejection was surprising because the student, a close friend, was so high scoring and personable. The person who told me this had no idea that I had interviewed the student. The description of the rejected student was nothing like the way the student had acted during their interview with me.

[kluge]

Tokenadult, I would assume that the "perfect" SAT's were the result of superscoring. My guess is that that would expand the number significantly.

[shennie]

My oldest graduated in 2002. He had a close friend that had great stats. This friend had 1600 in one sitting, a 35 ACT, 5 SAT IIs all with 800 accept for writing which was 750 or so. 3.97 uw GPA (he got a B one semester in 11th grade English. He took every AP the school offered. (This is an urban public without a lot of APs.) In addition, he took 4 classed at UW-Madison - multivariable calc, differential equations, and 2 computer programming classes - where he earned all As. He participated on the math team for 4 years, was on the soccer and rugby teams, and played bass in the school orchestra. He was also very active in his church and had lots of volunteer work through that.

He was turned down outright by MIT. Who knows why? He is a great kid from a state that doesn't send a ton of kids to MIT. He interviews well, has multiple interests, had a ton of awards... I don't know if MIT was his first choice honestly and maybe that showed through on his application. He graduated from Carleton in 2006 and is now in a PhD program for math. He is quite happy and had a great college experience.

So, I don't know the answer to your question. We know that at the upper levels, college admissions can be capricious. Had my son's friend did not apply to any of the Ivy schools. If he had, I am willing to bet he would have had some acceptances, but we will never know. I think Carleton was his top choice all along. Ultimately, kids with top scores will be accepted to some wonderful schools as long as they are willing to look outside of the Ivies.