@websensation - NV
I got an email from college board with an access code for my scores today.
Just great! I just heard back from the College Board (if you want to talk to someone that can do more than read off a script the code word to use is “escalate” and some one with more knowledge will call you back) unfortunately for us it was bad news.
Someone reported a “testing irregularity” at the test location where the majority of Austin homeschoolers took the PSAT. Now all the scores from that location are on hold until they can investigate. They say they have requested that it be looked into right a way (why they couldn’t have been looking into it in over the past 3 months IDK!) they have no idea how long it will take, what they will do if there was a problem or even what the problem was!
@Mamelot
Could you tell me how you get 218 score? It seems high as last year’s cutoff is 215 in MN. Are the scores from this year test really inflated that much? CA or MA may need 225 or above to qualify for semifinalist.
@3scoutsmom I am so sorry! I cannot believe that they haven’t had that figured out in the last 3 months. WHY would they wait until now??? This is ridiculous. You should get a refund. You were the one that actually needed those scores for impending programs your kids were applying to.
This scares the bejesus out of me for the March SAT. Based on his great PSAT results, we are banking on the SAT now. He’s still taking the ACT in Feb as backup, but he obviously favors this new SAT, so we have to go with it also and see. We’ll be lucky if we have scores back from the March test by the 4th of July.
I wish the press was all over this!
I wrote in the other thread
http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/discussion/comment/19163206/#Comment_19163206
We cannot reconcile the %tile data from current 2015 report with the concordance table.
Any thoughts? @mathyone @PAMom21
@3scoutsmom I am so sorry to hear that. I cannot imgaine.
Can your DS20 take some other test, SSAT, ISEE or ACT for high school? I know it is really late…
For DS18, I would have him just take practice test on-line and prep.
Maybe time to move on to ACT.
@Ynotgo - maybe (hopefully) the 4.5 million included non-juniors? Some of the public HS here in N. CA require the sophomore classes to take it.
@Dave_N - Since the double-weighting of the verbal is not anything new, I don’t think we will see any significant shift in the number of males vs the number of females this year. I do wonder though why verbal is double-weighted. Are verbal skills prized more highly than mathematical/analytical skills? My son is an extremely strong math student and this method of calculating the selection index disadvantages him. We are in KY so hopefully his scores will be high enough to qualify him (690V, 760M, 1450, 214 SI, 99th percentile). But I find it frustrating that strong verbal students are rewarded more than strong math students. If my son had scored 690M/760V instead of the other way around, then his SI would have been 221 instead of 214. I find both math and verbal to be equally important and I think they should be weighted accordingly. Anyone else have any strong feelings on this subject?
@8o6peary Typically more than half of the PSAT takers are sophomores and some are freshmen. So, I’d suspect that will remain the case.
Sorry to hear that @3scoutsmom. How frustrating to just find that out now!
@starjoy8 94% isn’t good enough for National Merit.
But don’t think for a second those are bad scores. Once you take the SAT, you’ll be able to get into many schools with those scores.
@VandyAlum93 I respectfully beg to differ, not on the ground that Math is less important than Verbal skills, but on the ground that there are THREE sections in PSAT questions, meaning there are approximately TWO times more Verbal questions than Math questions. Therefore, to my mind, EACH section should be accorded equal weight. Now, if there were only ONE Verbal section and ONE Math section, I would agree with you, but this is NOT the case.
My family is very math heavy too, and the weighting has always bothered me a bit. Fortunately the former grammar section worked like mathematical code for my 2015 kid. I either read here, or had a live discussion very recently, that the weighting was indeed added to bring more girls into the mix. Years, and years, and years ago, before even my testing in the 1980’s. I haven’t had the chance to research to see if that was true or not, and wish I could remember where I heard/read it.
My kid got 750 on reading and writing, 750 on math (total 1500), hope the score is good for National Merit.
reply to post #3164…this is some good data, I thank you for getting the info. Let me give you one more 1430 (710 R/W 99th User Percentile) (720 M 98 User percentile ) Total User percent of 99 and SI of 214. I think to really find the lowest 99th SI you need all the data I have given you…IOW, need R/W score and R/W User Percentile, Math score and Math User percentile and lastly Overall score, but more importantly Overall User percentile …All this is important because of the way SI weighs W/R more heavily than math…ie its 2/3rds of the score, but for the .This would get you to the exact lowers 99th SI
D has been getting college e-mails and snail mailings, which is typical after the student has taken the PSAT. Funny, she had checked the box that she did not wish to receive mail. Anyway, the last few days she has gotten a few minority recruitment e-mails. There was one from Colby today, for example. I am wondering if this means she made the National Hispanic award at least. Anyone else getting these, and do your scores suggest you would have made the cutoff for the National Hispanic level?
Here in NJ, no scores yet!
@MTRainier Your kid definitely made the cut, no matter what state he is in.
One comment I have is that the word “National” in “National Merit” is sort of misleading. The calculation for semi-finalist selection is done based on each state’s scores (not national) but the award is given out across the nation. The word “national” implies that the selection standard is equal across the nation. I am not trying to start any controversy, but I find this amusing. Lol SI scores ranging from 203 to 225 among 50 states is just too wide IMO. Good thing the range is not from 180 to 225. Lol
is 220 straight for California or am i in gray area?
@chyaboi123 You definitely have a good chance IMO. However, I would not be shocked if the cutoff for CA is 221, but 220 is the probable cutoff IMO. Purely personal view. Should have a better idea in May when CB comes out with updated Concordance Tables.