If your 2015 score is 228, add 12 to get a corresponding 2014 score of 240.
If your 2015 score is 214, add 10 to get a corresponding 2014 score of 224.
If your 2015 score is 205, add 8 to get a corresponding 2014 score of 213.
If your 2015 score is 202, add 4 to get a corresponding 2014 score of 206.
If your 2015 score is 200, add 2 to get a corresponding 2014 score of 202.
If your 2015 score is 198, add 0 to get a corresponding 2014 score of 198.
This would imply that the CA cutoff is 213. (Because adding (slightly less than) 10 gives you a 223, which was the 2014 cutoff.) Texas, which was 218 in 2014, would be ~209 on the 2015 test. North Dakota, which was 201 in 2014, might be 199 or 200 in 2015.
As has been discussed, I think the conversion above (based only on percentiles) is overly optimistic. But it is (one) way to interpret the percentile data.
CA cutoff from 1 years ago - 223. No place to look that up.
CA cutoff from 2 years ago - 222. That was the 1 from the top of the 99s.
CA cutoff from 3 years ago - 223. That was the 1 from the top of the 99s.
CA cutoff from 4 years ago - 220. That was the 1 from the top of the 99s.
TX cutoff from 1 years ago - 220. No place to look that up.
TX cutoff from 2 years ago - 218. That was the center of the 99s.
TX cutoff from 3 years ago - 219. That was the center of the 99s.
TX cutoff from 4 years ago - 216. That was the center of the 99s.
So if you trust this year’s SI table, CA cutoff is 212, and TX cutoff is 209.
I don’t believe those will be the cutoffs - I think they’re way too low. But whatever…
Thanks @doyleb - that does make me feel a little better sitting on 221 in the highest cutoff.
In the 2012 report, that year’s cutoff at the top was 224 (Class of 2014)- which is 1st or 2nd 99+ percentile for SI (hard to tell, because they lump them at the top).
But in 2013 (Class of 2015 cutoffs) cutoff was also 224, and that shows 99th %, not 99+. So my kid APPEARS to be well into the 99+ based on this years Page 11 report. But, we think those are inflated.
@suzyQ7 wrote:“How inflated do you think they are at the top?”.
It’s really hard to say. All we have to go on is some state data, historical numbers of NMSFs, and the performance of those schools this year. We don’t have exact data for those schools, so all we can do is estimate based on the data we do have. The concordance tables yield results that don’t seem unreasonable compared to the reported numbers we are seeing - perhaps a bit low, maybe not. The testmasters estimates are based on the (preliminary) concordance data. But it is still a guess.
I’m confident of this though - when the cutoffs come out, CA will be at just below the real top of the 99s, TX will be at the midpoint of the real 99s, and GA will be a little below the middle of the real 99s.
Which is why I stated earlier that I believe the reason CB publishes the SI data one year after the fact is that if they published real data now, we would have no problem estimating the cutoffs very accurately. They want to announce that on their own schedule, not ours.
Agree. Plus, there are finite number of people working at NMS Corp. Right now, or in December- when CB normally releases PSAT scores, the NMS people are focused on reading apps and figuring out which ~1000 kids are getting cut from the current contest. They are sending letters and determining SAT cutoffs. They are working with colleges who particpate in the program and sending official notices to winners of Class of 2016.
They are beginning to gather the state numbers they need to begin the allocation calcs for the Class of 2017, but are likely not heavy into that yet. This year it will take them much longer to calc the cutoffs with the redesigned test.
@DoyleB, so CB put out false data this year so people can’t guess the state cutoffs? Really?
When the state summary reports are released, we can guess the state cutoffs pretty accurately - probably within 1-2 points. Do you think the summary reports are going to be false data also? Just so we can’t guess state cutoffs?
I think you are correct. You can look at previous years and approximate where in the 99th percentile your state’s cutoff will be. Previous year’s PSAT Understanding Scores release was compared to the preceding year’s test results, right? Whereas this year, PSAT Understanding Scores 2015 is compared to representative sample or we don’t know what. That is why the percentiles could be unreliable, right? Is there actually anyway to know how unreliable they are? I agree that CB does not want to make data so clear that we can estimate easily a particular state’s cut off. But this year seems particularly hard to predict.
@AJ2017, and why does CB not want you to estimate state cutoffs correctly? You think someone at CB is sitting in an office, saying, “how to obscure the data so people can’t predict…”, “I don’t want them to know… ha, ha, ha”.
No I don’t think they’re trying to fool anyone. I believe the state reports will be accurate. I believe that either the test sample was very different than actual test takers, or they simply screwed up and didn’t account for the changes in number of answers and eliminating the guessing penalty. Either way I believe that this year’s SI table is bogus.
After they’ve scored all of the tests, it would take 5 minutes to generate a 100% accurate SI table. They never publish such a table in their “Understanding Scores” document. Why do YOU think they don’t publish such a table when it is trivial to produce? Why do they give you the previous year’s data instead?
I am in Oklahoma and my son got 1450 and SI 216. I talked with GC at his school and she said that there are 27 juniors scored over1400. We usually have 6-8 NMSF every year. Also she mentioned you have to be in 99.5%, top 0.5% not 1% to be eligible for NMSF. I don’t know this is just in Oklahoma or every states. I’m just wondering and if my son’s score is good enough.
@speedy2019 Not sure I follow. “I think the SI % table is going to be correct - or nearly correct.” By this do you mean that the SI % they published are correct or very close to correct? According to CB they DID equate the 2015 PSAT scores to their research study results right? Someone asked that question and they said yes - SI %ile is based on research study.
@DoyleB, I’m not trying to sound mean or an a**hole.
Let me ask you a question about the scoring curves. If the scores were so high, why was the curve for Reading & Math lenient compared to Writing? Wouldn’t CB adjust the curves to push scores down more?
I think the CB’s priority is to get more kids to take SAT, even if that makes the NMS Corp’s job more difficult. I think they do work closely with NMS on certain things (release of info, showing certain data points on reports etc…) but in the case of the redesigned SAT, their priority is to make kids who take the PSAT want to take the SAT. So, they made the SAT and PSAT more like the ACT and introduced Khan academy to help kids do better etc… they WANT higher scores. More kids trending higher on PSAT = more kids wanting to go for SAT vs ACT. Plus more schools choosing SAT over ACT for large state contracts. That is where the big money is. Throw in the common core sales pitch- “Hey Dept of Ed President in big state X, your students scored so well on PSAT because it lines up with your common core curriculum, also, we’ll give you a big discount over the ACT you’ve been giving your kids the last 10 years”.
BOOM, there is a nice 5 year state contract with thousands of kids REQUIRED to take the SAT every year.
There is no way that that NMS could have been happy with the change that reduced the top score from 240 to 228. It compresses the scores and make their job harder. However, for CB, it works better for SAT comparison and what they are trying to do with SAT vs PSAT comparisons in future years.
I may have missed this, so sorry if I did, but do we know the actual format of this years report for counselors and whether it actually contains sortable SI%?
Just to make sure we are not putting people in the awkward position of asking for something that isn’t there.