Does relative lower score on one subscore hurts application?

Prep School Admissions
1

Hi, I wonder what would be considered a good SSAT score. My kid got good subscores on math and vocab, but only 701 (83% percentile) on reading, even though his overall percentile is good, he worries if admission officer would be picky on his low reading subscore? Can you please share your experience on this? Kid does not enjoy SSAT test, we are debating whether to re-take the test. Thank you very much!

2

To answer your question a good score is at or higher than a target school’ average. If the lower sub-score is still relatively strong it should not make too much of a difference: 83% is still respectable. However it really depends on the schools you are considering. If you are aiming for the very top schools then it might hurt him only because the top schools get so many 95% and up. Make sense?

3

Thank you very much for your reply. When you said “top schools get so many 95% and up”, I would like to add some detail off my son’s scores: he got 800 (99%) on math, 794 (98%) on vocab, 701 (83%) on reading, his overall percentile is 98%, is he considered as one of the students who get 95%, or they will be picky at his 83% reading? We are are targetting some schools ranking between 25 -35, do you have any insight info what kind of average score these school would have?

4

Thank you very much for your reply. When you said “top schools get so many 95% and up”, I would like to add some detail off my son’s scores: he got 800 (99%) on math, 794 (98%) on vocab, 701 (83%) on reading, his overall percentile is 98%, is he considered as one of the students who get 95%, or they will be picky at his 83% reading? We are are targetting some schools ranking between 25 -35, do you have any insight info what kind of average score these school would have?

5

I think these scores are fine for any school. If it were my kid I wouldn’t have him retake it.

If you haven’t yet, visit https://www.boardingschoolreview.com for schools’ mean SSAT scores. Some of the info is outdated but it’s a start. Up-to-date stats of admitted students can be found on some, though not all, school websites.

6

Agree with @GoatMama. The score is fine, and quite good. Should not be an issue anywhere. Again we know nothing else about your child but that score gives you latitude to consider all schools.

7

Those are excellent SSAT scores. There is no reason why he should have to retake!