<p>Almafuerte, let me take a shot at your question because I’ve had the same question, and it has been hard to get a clear answer.</p>
<p>That list floating around with the state by state cutoffs? Those estimates are indeed for semi-finalist status. My understanding is that within this pool of 50,000 right now, are both commended and semi-finalist students. What wll separate them in september is the state cutoff. Those whose PSAT scores are below it will officially be designated Commended. Those whose scores are above their state’s cutoff will be designated SF.</p>
<p>Why couldn’t they tell us now since they have everybody’s PSAT scores? I guess it’s because they have to do all that computing (explained in an earlier post) to determine the exact cutoff by state.</p>
<p>I think if your score looks strong compared to last year’s for CA, you’ll be SF.</p>
<p>Congrats!</p>