Would 1580-->1600 SAT make a difference? & other UChicago admissions questions

JBStillFlying
Fri, 31 Jan 2020 06:32:37 +0000

^ I remember reading about that one! You truly have to wonder whether it was “easier” or whether it was just a bad test. I think either that one or another from earlier that year had weird scaling that would drop you several notches as well as several faulty questions that got eliminated. CB really got a black eye that year. Also, in very early 2016 when the first PSAT scores came out (my D was in contention for NM at the time), it was unbelievable how off CB’s percentile table was from reality. They didn’t calibrate the test very well at the tails. That’s by design - the new SAT is used to measure “college-readiness” rather than assessing high aptitude or achievement (or whatever you call great test-taking skills) so they were far more concerned with mean results and whether districts and states were hitting “benchmarks” that were pretty low in comparison with what the NM kids were scoring. Everyone ended up all bunched up at the high end and it has only gotten worse in the years since.