A lot of the timing depends on where the student is in math. In our district the students are put in into one of three math tracks in 5th grade. Since top students in 5th grade are not always the top students in 11th grade, some students in search of high scores to have not completed all the math they need by their sophomore year.
Since the new SAT has more of an Algebra/Trig focus, my D feels it better plays to her math strengths. However, the math track she is has in Pre-Calc her junior year. She by-passed testing early and will take the new SAT in May and June of junior year.
My D has also found that her AP English Lang teacher is introducing some SAT prep (she teaches the schools PSAT prep class) so this Spring should be the apex of her SAT prep.
The GC at our private school strongly encourages all students to be done testing by the end of junior year and to have all applications done by the end of October senior year.
Mainly the impression that I get is that some students seem to be cramming the test taking into early senior year. Also, lots of students take only the SAT or ACT, possibly more than once if their first score was unsatisfactory, without trying the other test.
Do people not realize that for some families there are extenuating circumstances & that’s why their kids could only take the tests once &/or only in their senior year? For some it could be financial. For others, something else. For us, my son is lucky to still be alive. There was no way he could have taken the tests as a junior. Taking the tests once does not mean the kid is stupid & couldn’t pass or the parents didn’t know about them. Horrible things happen. Things that are far worse than getting less than a 2200 on the SAT.
@Zinhead, the gifted/ honors kids are taking it so they can use it for admission to programs like SET, CTY summer programs, TIPs, NUMATS, Davidson Institute THINK, etc. It doesn’t really have anything to do with college admissions.
Many are cramming the re-testing into senior year, including some who think December is fine. (Though plenty take the SAT2’s in fall.) I think many kids who purposely wait until senior year may be aiming differently.
FF gives us an exception and, yes, many simply can’t take it early. If there are extenuating circumstances, yes, adcoms will consider that. Best wishes to your son.
October of senior year feels early to have all RD apps in. There’s so much growth between Sept and Dec.
Could such circumstances be more common? For example, in a high school where few go to any selective college (even minimally selective ones), would students and counselors have little awareness of the optimal SAT and ACT testing schedule strategy, resulting in not even considering the desirability of taking the test in junior year?
@FarscapeFan I didn’t get the impression that anyone was judging anyone based on when or how frequently they had done their standardized testing. A question was asked and folks are answering based on their/their kid’s own personal experiences. It sounds like you have experienced a tragedy and I am glad to hear your son is alive.
In the interest of answering the original question, we have two in college and two more coming up. The youngers have taken SAT since middle school based on gifted programming they participate in. Our third is now a senior and he opted to not take the SAT as a senior, having taken it previously. His superscore is 2080-not a barn burner by CC standards but he still expects/hopes to get in to a top 20, and he may. Our fourth got a 2130 as a freshman. The older two took junior year and again early senior. Depends on what works for the family and for the kid.
@intparent - The whole point of SET, CTY summer programs, TIPs, NUMATS, Davidson Institute THINK, etc. is to enhance the educational/college admissions process.
I think the College Board has been advising kids (and their counselors) to start testing in spring of junior year and again in fall of senior year for a long time - since at least the 80s.
As to the comment above about finances, aren’t fee waivers are available to prevent finances being the issue? Don’t know the details but I assume they are available regardless of the age of test taker and more than once.
Even at the very low income low resource high schools I used to work at, the tests were taken in junior year. Of course they were also state mandated so that could help set the schedule.
I don’t know where you see this trend of cramming senior year.
“would students and counselors have little awareness of the optimal SAT and ACT testing schedule strategy,”
GCs don’t operate in some sort of mindless void. They talk, they read, they learn. And if they are in circumstances where few kids go to, say, even comm college, the deadlines are different. Fall might be fine. The extra prep and thinking time, the extra maturing, might be the best for some of those kids.
Older son took SAT in Mar and May of junior year. Subject tests in June.
Younger son took SAT in Mar. Subject tests in May and June. (Didn’t like one of his scores and two schools htat he applied to need three of them.) Then retook SAT in fall of senior year.
I can see the value in taking it before the junior year PSAT especially if you actually do some real prep work. (My kids didn’t do much.)
@Zinhead, you are definitely misinformed. My kid who took middle school tests is profoundly gifted (IQ test over 160), and desperately needed peers. Her participation in a CTY online forum for gifted kids and at Davidson THINK were the greatest experiences of her life before college because she met kids like herself, and it was honestly essential to her mental health. We weren’t thinking of college at all – just trying to get her what she needed.
@intparent - How presumptuous for you to assume that your experience with these early testing programs mirrors that of everyone else. Our district is fortunate to have a quite large and successful gifted/honors program, with numerous students scoring in the 30’s or higher on the ACT in middle school. Most of the parents that I know that have kids in the program view ACT/SAT testing as essential to college prep, and the high school encourages and celebrates the academic achievement of its most successful students. Perhaps they do not have many mental health issues because there is a large and active peer group available to them.
Not sure what you mean Zinhead? Taking ACT/SAT early does not count for college admissions as far as I know and most kids that score in the CTY range in middle school, score higher in HS. Do you mean that taking these tests over and over is good prep for college applications?
Even in highly ranked districts where there may be a lot of gifted kids, kids that meet the Davidson criteria are few and far between and there would not be a cohort at almost all high schools, except perhaps for certain magnets. Many profoundly gifted kids do just fine with the local peer group, but others do not.
My kids also took the SAT in middle school for CTY, but I didn’t count that. Those scores disappear from the records and I don’t think their familiarity with the test did much except perhaps ease anxiety about it. They didn’t study for them at the time at all. One did CTY programs and loved them. They other preferred to do less academic stuff in the summer. The only kids who took these tests in our middle school were ones who were already scoring in the top 10% of other previous standardized testing. Most kids will take the SAT or ACT for the first time in high school.
@mom2and - ACT/SAT scores taken in middle school are not provided to colleges. Any ACT/SAT scores taken in high school can be used by colleges if they desire. Our kids were offered/invited NUMATS, but we decided not to pursue it, as did a number of their peers. I can see the advantage if one lived in an area with marginal schools and a lack of a gifted/honors program, but that was not our situation.
As for taking these tests for practice, yes, I believe it is good prep for college applications. The early and consistent testing highlights a student’s weak areas, and lets the student do supplemental work to bolster soft spots. This is particularly true of the math sections because many high school course sequences do not cover the most advanced information on the ACT/SAT.
Many people do not agree with the above statement, but let me relate a story of a good friend. She followed the traditional path of taking of having her kid take the PSAT, and then the SAT/ACT in the junior year. Her child missed the entrance requirements for the in-state flagship by one ACT point, and ended up attending an out of state flagship. The child was disappointed because he had to attend what was perceived as a backup school while the child’s friend went to the in-state flagship, and the parent was disappointed that she had to spend an extra $20,000 over four years sending her child to a OOS school the child was not happy with. If they had taken the standardize tests earlier, they might have been able to bump the test score by a point or two.
As an aside, another friend of our runs a tutoring/test prep business. When she opened it up, she thought most of her test prep work would come from parents of kids with an ACT in the 20’s trying to bump it up, but was surprised that the bulk of her test prep clients were kids with ACT’s above 30 trying to get to the 35-36 range.