<p>My S has a 770M and a 580CR score after taking the SAT a second time. These scores seem to widely straddle the middle 50 percent at almost every school he plans to apply to. Should he take it a third time? He really doesn’t want to and his previous CR was a 570 so unless he is committed to really preparing, I am not sure it will make a difference. But I am concerned about the spread.</p>
<p>You are right to be concerned, as that might look skewed to colleges (can this person actually think through a piece of literature?). However, if your “S” has very good grades in humanities courses, then perhaps this might buffer their concerns. How was the writing score? If it was also very low, then perhaps a retake might be in order…
Another thing to worry about is total score. Although schools claim that they do not have cut-off scores, they (in fact) do have some ideal “cut-off” in mind (although students do get in who are below that). Retaking (as long as your “S” is willing to put in the time…have you considered enrolling “S” in a SAT prep course?) might boost that score to beat that cut-off.</p>