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<p>Who are we kidding here? The STEM-uber-alles group doesn’t think so. Nothing can compare to the primary of math and science and literal, concrete, in the box thinking. There’s no value in self-reflection, in contemplating bigger issues, in examining your thoughts and feelings and what lessons you learn from them in both everyday and big things. Can you do the work, over and out.</p>
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<p>But who cares? Why it is all such a race? Who actually thinks it’s meaningful in any real-life sense? It’s hardly as though people who get these 700’s before the age of 13 wind up doing anything any more amazing in life. Good grief, relax already. Life is not about just scoring well on standardized tests.</p>
<p>We don’t know they are admitting RI kids at a lower rate. Only that there are fewer in number, from a small state. In fairness to analyses, you’d need to check past years’ rates, as well.</p>
<p>It’s also harder to fake compassion and variety of interests, some breadth to the kid, willingness to engage, to climb out of his own narrow zone, if all you show is unilateral. </p>
<p>The notion of relaxing has come up a few times- and it is needed. There is no one formula, no sense highest stats are most important, that taking an SAT in 7th matters to anyone but the friends, family and teachers of that kid. Being superb at chess in 1st grade isn’t as important as what choices are made and what impact a kid has in the final 3 years of hs- when he is a more mature person, more independent.</p>
<p>As for the big competitions- great. The question is, “And then, what?”</p>
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<p>It’s really of no consequence, beliavsky, if the kid who has the 750 at age 17 would or would not have gotten a 750 at age 13. The focus is on the here-and-now. I suspect you came from one of those “HYP should be my prize for working really hard all my life” types of backgrounds. Guess what? HYP doesn’t care. Are you smart enough here and now at age 17 to do our work? Great, pull up a chair. Now I want to get to know you better.</p>
<p>CTY is a pretty common program for smart middle schoolers and early high schoolers, and they require the SAT. The people I know who took the SAT early did it to qualify for that program.</p>
<p>Yes, collegealum, we know. We’re not talking about people for whom taking the SAT was an incidental, necessary piece of applying to a program of interest. We’re talking about people for whom it’s really important to get that SAT score at age 13 so they can be assured of their kid’s budding genius, and make sure that everyone, esp the college, knows that their kid got it at age 13, and therefore they are So Much Smarter and More Deserving of the Elite College Prize than the slacker who got the 750 math only when he took it at age 17. Beliavsky clearly believes that the 750-at-13 kid deserves more brownie points than the 750-at-17 kid for some reason, under some belief that standardized test scores are the be-all and end-all.</p>
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<p>Or the ACT or SCAT or Spatial Test Battery – see [Eligibility</a> | JHU CTY](<a href=“http://cty.jhu.edu/ctyonline/apply/eligibility.html#Grade_7_and_above]Eligibility”>http://cty.jhu.edu/ctyonline/apply/eligibility.html#Grade_7_and_above) . There are other talent searches serving primarily the south (Duke TIP) or the midwest (Northwestern) that also use the SAT or ACT as qualifying tests.</p>
<p>Several people have asked what the point of taking a college entrance exam in 7th grade is. Do they think talent searches and gifted programs are pointless? They could visit the sites of the talent search programs to understand why students participate. Experts on gifted children agree that they need to be identified using above-grade-level tests. A student who scores 700s on all three SAT sections in 7th grades should probably be grade-skipped and/or attend a school for gifted children. One who scores 700+ on the math section should be accelerated in math.</p>
<p>Actually talent searches and programs can be quite useless. It still depends on what the kid did with them, how able he is to present well. Gawd, some are still stuck on quantitative. Just for grins, try seeing through a different lens.</p>
<p>I have yet to see a CTY kid who explained what significant change it made in his life, as part of an app. (They seem to understand it is not the be all and end all.) Also, having CTY is not predictive of crafting a good app.</p>
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<p>Oh, my, guess we missed an opportunity with my first son. He took the ACT at age 13 and squeaked out the 35. He only took it because he was a high school junior at the time and it was required; had we known, he could have taken it a year earlier to demonstrate his “budding genius.” ;)</p>
<p>Sue 22, “Are you seriously suggesting that all of the applicants who fall into these categories are academically unqualified?”</p>
<p>No not at all, just suggesting that the number of slots set aside for reasons based on matters separate and apart from academic merit are higher than people think. Remember many qualified students do not get into top schools. It is nto a question of being qualified, as opposed to which qualifed students are admitted and how you select them.</p>
<p>Pizzagirl,</p>
<p>I’m not “stewing” (lol), just find it surprising that legacies receive such a big push and do not agree with that policy. Also, thanks for reminding me about internationals, which I agree wth you is a great thing, but also does add to the set-aside slots. </p>
<p>As for your question
“If these colleges were so concerned with just perpetuating the same racial makeup as generations ago, tell me again why there are also privileges given to URM’s? And tell me again why so many are welcoming internationals?”</p>
<p>Not suggesting that the colleges want the same racial make-up as decades ago, just that by taking so many legacies (30% AR at Harvard, 34 to 47% AR at Princeton) it makes it harder for these schools to achieve those goals and results in a squeeze out that impacts top students, especially asians.</p>
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<p>The Study of Exceptional Talent accepts only the One True Standardized Test :), the SAT.</p>
<p>Ime, these slots are not “set aside.” Clearly they know, from the recent past, how many they might see. There is no fear about denying an unqualified legacy. What some are missing is that they want kids who will “fit and thrive” at that school- and, at the same time, want kids, in general, to find the place where they will fit and have the better chance of thriving. They easily let go of many kids who deserve a better match, one where they can be cream.</p>
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<p>Beliavsky, my own kids took the ACT around that age to qualify for CTD, which is the midwest version of CTY. D attended CTD for 2 years and S for 5 or 6 - they had terrific experiences and both are glad they went. </p>
<p>No one says that talent searches are pointless. But we’re kind of snickering at the concept that HYP should make a point of caring about middle school test scores, and all else being equal, admit the kid who did well in middle school SATs because he’s Clearly Some Genius compared to the kid who did absolutely just fine in high school SATs, and by golly, his Superior Genius had better be recognized and acknowledged by all.</p>
<p>I’m just going to blow your mind, Beliavsky, by noting that I have a kid in a top 20 university and a kid in a top 10 LAC, and neither of them ever took the SAT at all.</p>
<p>I just dropped in on this thread…am I the only one reading it who thinks it is ridiculous, at least with respect to the recent posts?</p>
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<p>I guess those of us located in fly-over country need to get better edumacated on proper procedure. ;)</p>
<p>Looking forward,</p>
<p>Re set aside slots, disagree with you a bit on that. Probably not quotas, but still there have been remarkably consistent numbers for certain groups over time. The admission rates for example at Harvard have been remarkably consitent with URMs over the years (2003-12) AA’s 11.2 to 12.8%, Hispanics 8.9 to 10.7%. Beyond that, the colleges need a set amount of athletes every year (usually 10 to 15% at small universities) and the legacy rates at Ivies seems to range recently betweene 10 - 15% (agree much lower than the admit rate, but still a significant chunk). Not sure about internationals, but would be surprised if there were huge variances year to year at Ivies.</p>
<p>Just to be clear where I was coming from, I didn’t understand the difference between SET and CTY or CTD or whatever. The kids in my community mostly go to competitive colleges. The median SAT score at the school my kids attended in 7th grade is above 2000. And at least 8-9 years ago it was very, very unusual for parents to test their kids in 7th grade for any purpose at all. Generally, people didn’t care about talented-youth programs because none of our talented youth seemed bored. They were being challenged at school and at home, and had plenty of peers. </p>
<p>The few kids whose parents had them do this were smart, but not smarter than any number of other kids in their classes – and neither the passage of time nor the enrichment offered by whatever programs they did changed that. They were very successful students, but not by any means superstars compared to their classmates.</p>
<p>So my point is, if you are going ga-ga over kids’ 7th grade test scores, you had better make certain that everyone was being tested in 7th grade, and that you aren’t just rewarding a certain sort of parental sophistication and aggressiveness. I am fully prepared to believe that a 13 year-old who gets a 750 on an SAT test has a lot of brainpower, but I don’t believe that all the kids with that kind of brainpower are taking the SAT at 13.</p>
<p>"The median SAT score at the school my kids attended in 7th grade is above 2000. "</p>
<p>Really? 2000 median SAT for 7th graders? Are we still talking about earthlings?</p>