Unexpectedly Low Scores...

calgirl15
Wed, 23 Nov 2011 19:23:31 +0000

So I was expecting to receive at least a 700 on both the subject tests I took earlier this month, since I had studied for months for one and had earned a 4 on the corresponding AP test for the other. But then the results came back - I got a 670 on the first and a 530 (ick) on the other. I honestly have no clue what happened. I didn’t think I’d messed up so much. I also viewed the consolidated answers for the test I got a 670 on, and agreed with the vast majority of them, so I thought my score probably wouldn’t go below a 700. The worst thing is that I took five other subject tests and got very strong scores on all of them (750, 790, 800, 800, 790), so these will obviously look like outliers. Another bad thing is that I sent these scores to a school in the UK that I’m applying to, and they put a lot of emphasis on test scores, even more so than U.S. universities.

I’m still trying to figure out what happened - I really had no idea. I have a couple of theories. I highly doubt there was a scanning error, but I wonder if the College Board somehow got confused. When I registered for the SAT, they had my address in the U.S. on file. But I’m currently abroad (on a gap year), so I had to take the international versions of the tests. I don’t know if they messed up and scored my answer sheet according to the answer key for the U.S. tests, since the address I registered with was in the U.S. Is this possible? I know things happen, but I wasn’t having a bad day, and somehow getting a 4 and a 530 in one subject just doesn’t match up…