@4MyKidz and @eh1234 - D sounds like your kids! Last spring she “forgot” to do the NHS application. I found out about it the day before it was due which was too late because you needed teacher recommendations. She did have a crazy time before that - it was exam week and we also left early on spring break so she had to cram all of her exams into three days but I wold have liked to have known about it. (Now I am much better about checking the school website every week instead of waiting for her to tell me things!)
I thought we would have to wait until this spring to apply again but they just had a fall application come out a few weeks ago. I found out, mentioned it to D and she was like, what does it even matter? Ugh. I made her do the application anyway. It was due last Friday night at midnight. Guess what time she finished her essay and sent it in? Of course, Friday night at 11:30pm.
PSAT here is done during the week. I asked D where they take it and she said just in their classrooms. She has photography first period so they will have to go to another classroom because they don’t have regular desks. The strange thing to me is that the school pays for 8th-10th graders to take the test but they make the 11th grader pay for it. Why would they pay for the years that don’t count then not pay the year it counts?
The school sent out messages saying we had to pay for the test. I waited a week or so then remembered to pay (no big deal, just $15.) Two days later D says she was called tot he office where they told her because she was in the top whatever percent of kids last year the school pays for her to take the PSAT. Uh - thanks for telling us weeks after you told us to pay!
The county pays for all 9th, 10th and 11th graders to take the test. Kiddo has classes with seniors, and was quite pissed that they would be getting class time when he wasn’t. Next year he’s off the hook.
He is quite psyched to take the ACT. I got him a test prep book which he leafed through, quickly, and was encouraged by the format of all the science questions. “It’s just graphs, Mom, I can do graphs!”
Not paying for the PSAT for S19 or D21. All juniors get a “free” SAT in March at school as well. I put the “free” in quotation marks because, if you saw our taxes, you’d understand that we are indeed paying for all of the “free” stuff our kids get at school! I just looked up our state’s NMF cut off and it was 222 last year. That’s rough. S19 will have to have another amazing day and pretty much match his SAT experience to hit that number.
Yeah, I suspect my kiddo isn’t going to be making the cutoff either. We had thought there was no rehearsal last night until we got a text message at 7:15 asking where we were. Zoomed out to the rehearsal hall (hopefully didn’t trigger any yellow light cameras), discovered that they did not, actually, need kiddo and we had not misread the rehearsal schedule. So we hung around until 9 and headed for home.
Kiddo had promised to nap in the car on the way home, but we got into a conversation about gender and expectations and kiddo wound himself up into a frenzy at the total injustice of the world. He seemed awake enough this morning, but hoping that that isn’t false energy.
Oh, well, it’s just PSAT. It only counts if it’s spectacular, right? We don’t have to send those scores if they come out merely average.
It is interesting to see how different schools do things. We get a free SAT in the spring as well. We also get our AP and AICE exams paid for by the school.
Yeah, PSAT scores are irrelevant for 99% of test takers. Most people treat it as a practice SAT. But that’s why some test tutors encourage people to take the PSAT seriously. The theory is that someone normally in the 95th percentile, with preparation, can beat someone who’s normally 99th percentile but doesn’t prepare.
I don’t think that’s true, because the cutoffs are so high. In Texas, you need 221, which is a perfect verbal plus 95th percentile math. Even though D19 got 34 on her practice ACT, she’s unlikely to get 221 on the PSAT (her 34 translates to about a 217 on the PSAT). And I still don’t know if the 34 was a fluke. I guess we find out in 2 weeks.
Our school gives out free PSAT, but no free SAT or ACT. D19 is currently signed up for the Oct 28 ACT and the Nov 4 SAT, so we should have both scores before Thanksgiving.
Our school charges Juniors (and Freshmen) but it is free for Sophomores. I believe the Sophomores are taking it today and Juniors take it on the 25th. S19 has not registered yet but does need to. $16 here.
I think the cut off is 218 here, so maybe doable. I’m just not sure. D has had practices that made it and some that didn’t. Since she hadn’t taken any practices (aside from the SAT last weekend) since Labor Day, I don’t know where to expect her score. She could make it easily, just miss it, or miss it by enough that there wasn’t a chance. We were told by guidance counselors we wouldn’t get PSAT scores until December.
@ninakatarina I love the social justice conversations we have in our car. It’s great your son is passionate about it!
@ninakatarina Cut off here was 219, I am 95% sure D will not make that so I figured this would just be a forced practice. I love when my kids have those type of talks with me, I love to see them so passionate about certain topics. Especially D19, she is such a mellow kid that it is fun to see her get all fired up about something. D21 does the same thing but she is a theater kid so I am used to her being dramatic! It helps that we have the same views on most things - sometimes they gang up on DH though :))
@eh1234 S19 thought the PSAT today was harder than the SAT as well! Specifically, he thought the math was harder. I think it’s because there was more algebra and no trig and it’s been so long since he’s had to do algebra-specific problems. He got an 800 on the SAT math so it will be bizarre if he does much, much worse on the PSAT math. No idea what to expect in the score.
Agree with @gusmahler that this isn’t a big deal for 99 percent of the kids. With 750 kids in our fieldhouse taking the test, maybe 10-20 could manage a 222. And, on any given day, who knows which kids those are.
Normally, D19 underestimates herself and thinks she failed just about every standardized test she takes, including the National Latin Exam last spring in which she got a perfect score. For the PSAT today, she reports that it was a bit different than the SAT she took in August and the practice SAT and PSAT exams. For one, the reading passages covered scientific topics, which is right up her alley. Second, she indicates that the non-cal section was a bit unusual as it had more graphs requiring extrapolations and some logical thinking analysis required. Maybe it’s because most of her classmates didn’t have time to finish both sections while she did, but she didn’t think she “failed” this one.
S19 thought it was easier than the August SAT (but this one always pounds his chest after these types of tests). We shall see in December (scores come out the 11th) as I’m always curious to see the scores and how they compare to what they think they did.
The cite states December 11-13, so they should announce a more definitive date later (and disappoint a slew of folks if it’s any date later than the 11th)