Caltech “Bucket System” for SAT / ACT
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Anonymous
""We feel like we lose a lot of people who self-select out of our pool that we would have wanted to admit." the Institute has typically admitted a handful of students with scores below 750 each year. " I don't think people self-select out because they don't have the perfect score. They self-select out because CalTech is for students who want to pursue Ph.D. and research. Unfortunately, a lot of high scorers want a different path, Wall Street, med school, or law school for example. But good to know that they do differentiate between 790 and 750. |
Anonymous
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Test scores are predictive of success, even into students' sophomore and junior years," says Tamuz. "So, we don't want to give up on the SAT or ACT."
No more TO!!! |
Anonymous
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two thoughts
35 is a lot easier to get than 780, esp for verbal side. - This busts the myth that everything above a 1500 or 1520 is the same. "A hurdle to pass". Nope they think 780 is higher than 750. |
Anonymous
lol They also said a perfect score is a dime a dozen. |
Anonymous
| I'm glad Caltech released this because now I can save my $$ on an application that's just not going to happen. Great school, but not for my kid that's for sure. |
Anonymous
| I think all of the top tier (except the UC's) do this in one way or another. I appreciate CalTech being transparent and disclosing it. |
Anonymous
It may depend on how strong of an athlete your kid is - college teams typically need a certain average. I know at Ivies if you’re one of the best on the team, there’s a lower academic threshold. |
Anonymous
Where do they say some a dozen? Perfect scores are more common than they used to be but there are less than 1000 of them every year. There used to be like 7 of them. You'd make the news in the 1980s of you got a perfect score. |
Anonymous
Similar to Dartmouth disclosing that people with 1400 and above can perform the work there when they went back to test required. I appreciate it. |
Anonymous
They do this on every other country so that everyone knows what schools to apply to. The schools have fairly transparent cutoff scores. |
Anonymous
By "they" I don't mean Caltech. I meant DCUM moms ... |
Anonymous
CalTech and MIT are the only schools looking to fill 75% of the class from that 1580+ bucket, though. HYPS fill 25% of the class from that bucket, 50% from the 1500-1570 bucket, and 25% from the sub-1500 bucket. So DCUM moms are correct that 1500 or 1520 is the threshold for an unhooked kid to bother applying. |
Anonymous
False. MIT, Caltech, or HYP, all fill about 25% of the class with 1570/1580+. Caltech 75 percentile is 1570. |
Anonymous
Where are you getting that MIT targets to have 75% of the class as 1580 and over? My child was told by a recruiter that only 25% of MIT are above 1570. Or do you just mean MIT is "looking to fill" as in it aspires to have 75% in the 1580 bucket, but the reality is that MIT constantly falls far, far short of this "looking to fill" ideal? If that's what you are saying, I think that's an important distinction of MIT's goals for building a class vs. the reality of MIT admission. |
Anonymous
No, I think you’re right and MIT, like HYPS, is only shooting for 25% from that 1580 bucket. |