I read a huge number of threads…
Never read about
a. 12th grade entry in very good schools
b. Italian applicants in very good schools
Do I have to worry???
Please, tell me your sincere opinions
That’s because they are tiny minorities in boarding schools. Not all schools accept 12th graders, and applicants to 12th grade are a lot fewer too. As for your concerns about “very good schools”? I think those few that accept new 12th graders ARE all very good schools.
Yes, they may be very selective or quite not selective at all. Hidden gems generally do not accept 12th graders. That is a big problem for us. But, on the other hand, if applicants are fewer my d might have a chance… However, she is not a sport star nor is she a leader of something (as I said before the Italian system is different). She will try anyway! Who knows?
Thank you for your reply, Panpacific!
@Ranu67 Loomis is known as a rigorous school, but I’m not qualified to answer your question.
I would suggest you do a lot of research and cast a wide net. Once you have some acceptances you can start some serious comparisons as to strengths and fit.
I think you have a very uphill road trying for 12th grade admit. I don’t believe Loomis allows 12th grade entry.
You are definitely right, ProudLoomisDad.
As a matter of fact, I am doing a huge, enormous search. The fact is that I have to see things also from the inside, that is from your point of view. I can’t take into account too many things because we don’t share the same culture. Loomis accepts 12th graders, but it is difficult to know the numbers and the kind of selection. Sport stars? Academic students? Musicians? Now I understand, also club leaders.
My d is 15, attending the corresponding year of the 11th grade in a serious, hard school. Her gpa corresponds to a 4.9, I think, and her sat with no preparation is 1890 (700 in Math) - consider her mother tongue is Italian. She’s studying for her SAT now, she may improve it. Next year, when she and US students of her age will take it, her SAT will grow more (1 more year of preparation means a lot).
For these reasons I believe that we should look for schools whose SAT is not less than her current one. And those schools are the big ones!
Does it make any sense to enroll her in a school whose Sat is 1600 or less? From my point of view it doesn 't. She’s not obliged, it’s a reward, an opportunity. The cost will be the same. She’ll be far far away from home. Her current school is really good, she’s not escaping. Why come over here? Because she can learn a lot, meet people, a new culture, have a challenge with different methods of learning, flourish in a nurturing surrounding. She may prepare herself for a high level college/university.
A lot of 1900 SAT schools, unfortunately, do not accept 12th graders.
Should I look for far less demanding BS?
I’m really grateful for your points of view.
Sorry for being soooo long! Italians are a bit too talkative!!! 
:):))
If your daughter is only 15, she would be very young to be a 12th grader next year. My daughter is in 9th grade this year, and while she is 14, many of her friends are already 15 or turning 15 soon. At an American boarding school, I think that 15 year olds would typically be in 10th grade, and some of them in 9th grade. Almost none would be in 11th grade. Why not have her apply for 11th grade instead? It’s still hard to get accepted as a new 11th grader, but there are way more schools that take 11th graders than 12th graders. It would definitely open up more options for her.
Also, when you’re talking about 1600 or 1900 SAT schools, I assume you mean the school’s average SAT score? I’ve never heard of a school described that way, but I’m not sure I’d make too much of a correlation between a school’s average SAT score and the academic challenge it could provide for your daughter. And it would be largely irrelevant to a number of factors you describe as motivating your search, such as meeting new people, experiencing a different culture, having different methods of learning, etc.
… It is not so easy to take decisions being from another country… I’m so confused!!!
What you say is reasonable and wise. I’ll have to think about it.
She turning 16 at the very end of the year, so we can consider her (I should
She should not apply for 12th grade. 16 would be very young for a 12th grader. My daughter is one of the youngest kids in her grade, and when she starts 12th grade, she will have just turned 17. Most 12th graders are 18, or will turn 18 at some point during the year, and because many BS students repeat a year, there will be some kids turning 19. I think it would be extremely difficult socially to be a new 12th grader and to be so much younger than her classmates.
I have at least a (very) little familiarity with the Italian compared to U.S. school systems and also attended school in another language, so have some direct experience in that area. Congratulations to your child on these impressive achievements and you should not apologize for your written English, which is excellent. As you do not need a diploma from the U.S. school I would consider the challenges your child may find adjusting to a new school, culture, (possibly) climate and living away from home perhaps for the first time (?) as well as the strain that full-time use of a what I assume is her non-native language can represent as you think about the degree of academic challenge you want to seek from the school. When in doubt it may be better to aim a little lower to allow for adjustment and pursuing travel and other interests. While she may be qualified for and accepted to the top tier of schools, almost everyone here weighs the costs and benefits of attending such a school. As you get closer to a choice I would ask especially about the number of hours of expected weekly homework, particularly in areas like big written papers which would take longer to complete for anyone who has not had years of practice in writing in English to the expectations of a top U.S. prep school. Even for someone with an excellent vocabulary like your daughter, the specialized terms used in different academic areas can be tricky to assimilate while you are trying to keep up with new material. In addition, the cadence of academic life is also different at U.S. schools in general, relative to Italian liceo, with more emphasis broadly on informal class participation and daily homework and assignments over a major final exam. I also agree with others here that 11th grade may be a better and simpler choice. Best wishes in your search.
I would not discount schools with a lower SAT average right off the bat. For one thing, she will have a better chance of getting admitted if her score ranks well by comparison. Also the average is just the average. I think if you can find the SAT ranges, that would give you more useful information. Remember that the SAT is just a one day test and is only one part of considering if a school is a good fit academically. I like to look at the list of universities that the graduates have gone on to attend and (if the school has AP classes) how many students took and passed the AP exams.
Cupajo makes a good point too about the strain of having to think in English all of the time. My ds does not do math in English and on standardized tests he often has to translate the math vocabulary so that he can answer the questions. Next year will be his first year at an English language school and from his friends’ experiences making the switch, I think that it is likely he will have some bumps.
Good luck!
My computer is getting more confused than me!!! Ahahah! Sorry for leaving pieces of messages!
Maybe I was writing rubbish and it didn’t want to post it!
First of all I want to thank SoxMom and Cupajo (I don’t know how to underline the names!)
Thank you for your hints!
A part of me thinks the same things.
The other reflects on how she is. I’ve just cancelled (me, this time!) what I had written. Briefly, some kids just need more challenge. Someone can understand. But you are right that she may be immature if in the US kids are older in the 12th. In Italy she is in the right schoolyear, whose borderline is in the end of Dec.(like her bday).
The following year she will be preparing for her State Exam and Diploma in Italy, so it won’t be possible.
Taking her Diploma in the US will be of great importance, I think. For College, both US, UK and Italy(maybe less, here. Meritocracy is a word that here does not exist) For her curriculum.
Thank you for your help. Really!
Writing to you is a sort of writing to me! Auto-analysis!!!
That’s great! And it’s free!!! Ahahah!
For US or UK college applications, having a US HS diploma is not more important than a diploma from another country. There are many valid reasons to attend a US boarding school; this is not one of them.
Agreed.
My son will be 18 during 12th grade (assuming the best), and many of his classmates are a year older.
11th grade admission makes MUCH more sense.
Somewhere on here is a fantastic analysis of admit rates broken down by year of entry.
Thank you Skyeurope and you, Stracciatella (my favourite flavour)! You are probably right.
I also look at all other aspects, not only the Sat., like n of sts, % of boarders, rural/…, casual/…, %intl sts, n of APs, gpa, uni destinations, %teachers’ high degrees, one sanction policy, academic specialisations, unique aspects, curricular &extra-curricular activities , special programmes …
But, reading all messages on here, it seemed that Sat could be really important.
All this talk about HaDES, HIddengems and so on(I took note, none of them is under 1750/1800 SAT point average) made me think that it really matters. The first thing a kid is asked are his stats, his SAT, his grades/scores.
This probably made me believe that it was the point to focus. In Italy it really doesn’t matter. Neither at the high school level, nor at university. Then I was wrong. I have to revise all my points of view.
So little time!
Stracciatella, are u Italian?
LoomisDad, I will search for it! Thanks!
First of all, the kids are NEVER asked for their scores in interviews. Typically, when the interviews are conducted the kids haven’t yet submitted their application and test scores yet, and many of them haven’t even taken the tests yet. Second, I think you may be confused (perfectly understandably) by the whole issue of test scores. The SAT is a standardized test taken by 11th and 12th graders for purposes of college admissions. So when you see stats for a boarding school that the average SAT score is, for instance, 1900, that is NOT the average score for students applying for admission to the school. Instead that would be the average SAT score for the school’s graduates (and I think typically schools use the best score each student ever received on the test in calculating their school’s average).
Most kids applying to boarding schools are coming out of 8th-10th grades, and kids in those grades would not yet have taken the SAT. So they take a different test instead, the SSAT, for purposes of their boarding school application. You typically will see the SSAT scores expressed as a percentile, rather than a total score (like 1900). This is because they compare your child’s score to all the other kids of the same gender and in the same grade. So they’re comparing like with like. For instance, if my daughter took the SSAT when she was in 8th grade and scored in the 85th percentile, that means that when compared to all other 8th grade girls taking the test, she did better than 85% of them.
Schools that accept applications for the older grades (11th, 12th, PG) will typically accept scores from the SSAT, PSAT, or SAT as part of the application. But I don’t think there’s any school that makes public the average score for applicant submitting the SAT score, as there just wouldn’t be a very large number of such applicants and you probably can’t really draw much of a conclusion from it even if you did know what the average is. As a rough estimation, if your daughter’s current SAT score is as good as or higher than the average SAT score that a school is reporting for its graduating class, then certainly it would seem that she’s in the right ballpark (i.e., it’s not a waste of money to have her apply there).
But again given that she’s only 15, I would just have her take the SSAT. That will give you a much easier basis for making a comparison of how her score stacks up against the other applicants to any of the schools that she’s interested in. And remember that the SSAT score for a school is an AVERAGE. So just because her scores might be lower than the average doesn’t mean there’s no hope of getting in. But it’s still a useful piece of information in coming up with the list of schools to apply to. If, for example, her SSAT score puts her in the 70th percentile, you would not want to only apply to schools whose average is in the high 80s or low 90s. You could still have her apply to one or two of those schools, but would also want to include some schools where her score was closer to or even above the average.
@soxmom has made several excellent points. However, if Ranu’s daughter is applying for 11th grade, wouldn’t schools ask her for the SAT or the PSAT in lieu of taking the SSAT, which is primarily administered to incoming freshman and sophmores?
Thank you Soxmom for your explanation. This is exaclty my thought, reversed to the exit scores. ItcannotbeTrue said a correct thing: 11th and 12th grades have to submit the SAT, not the SSAT. that is why I was talking of it.
I did not really want to be rude, if it is that what you got.
I wanted to say that I did a lot of searching, I did not stop at the SAT scores only.
And it is not only a question of money (it is a big part, I am not a Kennedy!) but we have to understand if this great effort (emotional, intellectual, physical,…) really worth it. Noone can base this decision on the results only (scores, college admission, curriculum…) but they are important.
Why does someone choose Choate instead of Yyyy School, or Hotchkiss instead of Zzzz School, or St Paul’s instead of 'Xxxx School? Because, besides the great offerings they also offer great academic preparation, which is translated into scores (unfortunately)
In reality, I’m not fond of these kind of tests and scores at all.
They cannot give the general idea of the students, their enthusiasm, their engagement. They help ‘cold’ characters, the ones who are more competitive. The more sensitive(? right word?) and emotional ones can be penalised.
And a school is not its SAT. It’s easier to have super scores when you have only superbright students!
It would be much more difficult to have very positive scores with a wider net of abilities! That would show extraordinary work and effort of their teachers!
Sorry if I sometimes seem rude… It’s not my intention, but this is not my native language. and I can express myself in the wrong way.
I intended : …The first thing a kid is asked ON HERE (CC)
not in interviews…
All boarding schools, not just the “top” ones, offer “great academic preparation.”