I said, “say 85%”, as in suggesting an above average score for any given school. Schools are not chasing scores, they are looking for particular types of students. If only students with above 95% SSATs apply to Exeter (say), then even if Exeter considers 90% to be more than adequate, their SSAT metric will be higher due to the profiles of the applicant pool. None of these schools are impressed by 99% scores; they are impressed by applicants. All admittees need to be able to do the work, but none are chosen simply for their test scores. The schools might be more impressed if they only allowed one sitting but very few of these scores are earned in one shot. Almost all of the BS superscore – that’s how the metric is gamed. It becomes meaningless after a certain threshold.
I will only speak to our experience at Choate, but our son attends a highly selective college, and one imperfect test sitting was all Choate cared about for any of the highly selective colleges he applied to. Good enough was good enough, no score chasing as it just wouldn’t be a differentiator or determining factor in any rejections just as prefect scores would not make admissions more likely.
@ChoatieMom you are correct in that these schools are not chasing 99% scores, but if someone gets an 80% SSAT or 85% SSAT (which is excellent) and truly thinks they can improve upon it I would strongly urge the candidate to take it again and hope it is superscored.
We all know these schools look at an application holistically, and there isn’t one thing, one magic bullet, that will help gain admission. But SSAT scores are extremely important, and generally speaking, the higher the better.
These schools are looking for well rounded kids who are super smart. All else being equal, they will take the kid with higher grades and higher SSAT scores. When applying to the most selective BS it behooves anyone to do what they can to get the highest SSAT score they can, but obviously not at the cost of causing undue stress or wasting time that could otherwise be productively spent on ECs or simply enjoying life.
I’d just like to add that test taking is another type of specific skill. My son took the SSAT once, without any prep, and scored 99 overall. He did the same with the SAT in 7th grade and the SHSAT this year. He is extremely good at taking standardized tests - as he has put it, “They’re all written with a similar logic and they just make sense to me.”
Unfortunately for him, admissions are based on a lot more than that, and he is terrible in interviews. He struggles to make eye contact, is uncomfortable talking about himself and is nervous/shy around new people. This is a FAR bigger factor in admissions than the test scores. The charisma factor is difficult to quantify, but as a friend who worked as an AO for years put it, “There are some kids who just have ‘it’ - something special - about them, and you know it immediately.” As much as we would like to be able to score and categorize every aspect of admissions criteria, many of these decisions still come down to a gut feeling about the candidate.
@MtnTrailX: We’ll just have to agree to disagree. We took at face value what our son’s BS and his colleges told us which is what I posted above.
Superscoring has produced (IMO) a meaningless test arms race that does not produce or indicate smarter or more capable students, just better test takers, and enables some schools to report higher metrics for magazine ranking purposes. Everyone can decide how they feel about this and whether or not they wish to participate in the rat race. The schools our son has attended have clearly stated that anything above a particular threshold checks the box and they look no further. We chose to believe them and move on. I think too many people believe that a few points on a standardized test will make a decision difference “all else being equal.” But “all else” is never equal. This is just a thing we tell ourselves to justify good or bad results.
^disagree with @MtnTrailX and agree with @ChoatieMom. Go read the ivy results threads where the 35/35 ACT kids are upset because so many 33/34 kids were accepted and they were not.
Test scores alone do not get kids into top BS or top colleges. The magic formula is talented (sports, arts, others), smart, and an extra edge for URM and full pay. If you have 2 out of 3, you are in good shape. Then there is luck (does your profile/talent fit the needs of the school that year).
@suzyq7 No one here has ever said “test scores alone” get anyone into a top BS or top college. And everyone knows these things can be manipulated.
Through multiple (4) retakes a member of my family moved his ACT score up from 31 to 35, and was admitted to HYPMS. Did he get smarter in one year? No. Did HYPMS welcome his higher ACT score? Yes, because they needed his grades and scores to raise the Academic Index on his varsity team which had an overly low AI (think football or hockey!!!)
@MtnTrailX The sport is the hook. The 35 without the sport (or nothing else except top scores) would likely not get him in. Which is what I’m saying.
I suggest you watch some of the YouTube videos of the college admission process that some schools allowed to be filmed. Once you meet the academic threshold, the discussion is around activities, essays, personality, and institutional needs. No one is saying, well this kid had a 35 instead of a 34. Let’s pick him.
You are trying to scientifically scrutinize in this post, lol. I can see you are a numbers person, but the longer you stay on this board and read the college admission results the more you will see that what @ChoatieMom said is the case. Great ACT (not necessarily perfect), check. Great GPA (not necessarily perfect), check. Now what?
I am on kid#2 at BS and have a great feel for the process and personal insight into admissions.
We do know of at least 1 kid who got into PA a few years ago — no charisma, no nothing! The kind of kid who would not even talk to other kids on the school bus. No ECs except one common one on one night a week (not a sport). When he got in, we were shocked. Turns out he got 99 percentile on each section via superscoring. I mean his essays could have been outstanding, but i doubt his teacher recs were, as he had done nothing at school apart from studying. We think it was his SSAT scores and FP status.
@Winter2018 G’morning, it happens for sure, especially when an elite school is trying to fill a specific slot. Consider the Phillips Exeter Math Team and its successful participation in the International Math Olympiads. At least some of those students are admitted specifically for extreme giftedness in math, and are not checking all the proverbial application boxes in terms of ECs and well roundedness. It’s basically a high school version of attending MIT or Caltech, Not saying they aren’t deserving, only that some of the aforementioned are at PEA, essentially recruited, for Math and not for a track record in multiple ECs.
Besides we don’t know what goes on behind closed doors. The kid who never speaks on the bus, may be Mr. Showman full of charisma with the AO. You just never know. Some people know when to turn on the charm authentic or not.
@MtnTrailX if he had even participated in the Math teams at middle school or done well in the AMCs, it would make sense.
His mom thought it was his SSAT scores. I am now wondering if the bigger schools (PA/PEA) have a bucket for high test scorers (just like the Mathlete bucket) as I think someone else alluded to earlier. That would make much more sense to me.
FWIW, we now know of 4 kids who have got into one of these schools without a sport. One kid had that “it” factor going for him, but the others were pretty average kids – nothing spike-y.
@preppedparent, I truly do not think he can turn on the charm ( we are family friends). He is a decent and smart kid (although extremely introverted and interested in academics only) and perhaps sometimes, that’s all it takes to get in. I am glad that he never knew about the talk on CC that you need sports, ECs, etc. because he might not have applied.
^^It’s true, you just need to have something the school needs. maybe being a mathlete was enough for that school at that time.
I think what others are saying is you can up your odds if you also have sports, leadership in ECs etc. to more broadly hit things on their wish list
My opinion is that a single-sitting high test scorer most likely has achievements that corroborate that score, like Math Olympiad champ, that are the real reasons the applicant is attractive to a school. It’s not the test score; it’s the demonstrable achievements the test score validates. Mathlete fills a bucket, test scores don’t.
ChoatieKid was accepted without sports. I don’t think he’d ever thrown a ball or run a yard in his life.He picked up a sport at BS.
^^I had a state track star (sprinter) and a gymnast they wanted for their diving team, but both kids also had multiple leadership positions in EC’s and top, top, SSAT scores and were more than “nice.”
Nope, he was NOT a Mathlete. I’m sorry I wasn’t clear. He didn’t EVEN participate in any of the Math competitions the school had after school hours and did not place on the AMC 8s (the latter held during school hours).
