I joined College Confidential a few hours ago, and almost everyone posts “I have low SAT score of 2010… -_-” and have had pretty good academic record. Why is the community here so smart?
Because for many students with scores and grades more in line with the average, there might be less shopping around for the “perfect school.” Lots of people go to the state flagship and are perfectly happy there.
It’s a self-selecting group.
So the ones on this blog are somewhat more serious… Is that what you say?
You could probably make a case for that. People who don’t care about school aren’t going to spend their free time on a site about school.
Perhaps because people with SAT scores under 1500 out of 2400 shouldn’t be thinking about going to college, they should think about going to a trade school, or at least starting at a community college.
A lot of students understand that they need great scores and GPA’s to get into their schools, and, to find schools that are willing to fund their educations, so they work hard to have more options.
Financial aid is crucial when most schools are charging $50-$70K per year for their education.
@rhandco A 1500 SAT score is average. There are plenty of state colleges that will accept a score like that. It’s about equal to a 21 ACT, which is the national average. Yes, people with a 1500 will not be going to Harvard or Stanford but they can still go to a 4 year university if they are willing to put in the work. Some people are just bad test takers, it says nothing about their actually academic ability. GPA and ACT do have some correlation but they do not always follow each other. All that matters is their ability to apply themselves and be dedicated to their studies.
@chem12geek I’m in the same boat. Except I joined in the summer but didn’t start posting until recently. Anyway from what I can tell is most of the people on here are used to be around super competitive and highly driven classmates, so for some people a 3.7 is a low GPA or a 28 is a low ACT. Both of these are pretty good and will get almost anyone into a decent college.
I teach college. Very few with that SAT score, average at my state university, are willing to put in the work. Even some of the 2000 SAT score students are not willing to put in the work.
That’s why our state universities make so much money, we don’t support students enough even though we know a C average in non-college prep plus a 1500 SAT score means success is doubtful in four years. We let them fail over and over and they pay for six years of college instead of four.
That is very sad, rhandco.
That is horrible.
This is just a justified theory of mine but the students on here are “so smart” because they want to be able to be accepted to the most elite caliber of schools (HYPSM in particular I believe), and be able to attend those colleges, that have high academic and extracurricular standards and high tuition (usually). Good financial aid is most likely available, but of course we all would like scholarships! :-bd I guess people just want to gain more information that helps them do well in the college admissions game. I honestly am curious about this too.
At many third and fourth tier state schools the freshman retention rate is under 70% and 6 year graduation rate is under 40%. Students with incomplete degrees are very likely to default on their student loans.