Apply Test Optional if Score is at 25%-35% of range, right?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think the admissions staff below Ivy tier honestly don’t want your scores if they’ll bring down the school average for rankings. Ivys+ I think will hold it against you. Just my guess.

Emorys Test optional acceptance rate was 8% while the other was 17%. Not sure if Emory is ivy+, but I wanted to clarify info.

Correlation isn’t necessarily causation. The strongest students may be the ones who traveled to another state to take the SAT and aced it.

That is the issue, isn’t it? I don’t know that anyone (outside of the schools themselves) will have enough data to judge whether test optional helped or harmed otherwise similarly situated students.

After reading all of this, and other threads, my impression is that, if your kid is a star and has some very attractive qualities (whether a “hook” or some personal accomplishment) that makes them desirable to a given school, but has a test score that would lower the average test scores that they report to the ratings entities, you are better off applying test optional. On the other hand, if the student is your typical smart kid, but doesn’t have some other distinguishing qualities, a high test score could push them the top, and not having a score is a negative. I don’t have any data to support this, but it just seems logical.

I agree with this. Test optional is a tool that allows schools to ignore test scores from kids they want to accept but who don’t meet their minimum scores for standardized tests. This would be hooked kids or those with another special talent/ extracurricular.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think the admissions staff below Ivy tier honestly don’t want your scores if they’ll bring down the school average for rankings. Ivys+ I think will hold it against you. Just my guess.

Emorys Test optional acceptance rate was 8% while the other was 17%. Not sure if Emory is ivy+, but I wanted to clarify info.

Correlation isn’t necessarily causation. The strongest students may be the ones who traveled to another state to take the SAT and aced it.

Obviously, but when combined with other info like Vandy and USC don't have a difference in acceptance rate between test optional and submitting students, while Georgetown has 92% of it's class as test submitted. It tells a story that going test optional may be advantageous at a school like Vandy but very dis-advantageous at a school like Georgetown.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think the admissions staff below Ivy tier honestly don’t want your scores if they’ll bring down the school average for rankings. Ivys+ I think will hold it against you. Just my guess.

I think you're right. Here's one little anecdote from our experience last year. DS, who went to a local DC very rigorous private, had an SAT score that was at the 50th percentile for a SLAC that was a reach--not far reach--but reach. He had a great interview and great recommendations and average GPA for the school. The day before they were mailing out decisions, the school called my son's college counselor and said, "it would be in his best interest to change his application to test optional." He hopped onto his portal and clicked the box to change from submiting his score to not, and was accepted the next day. Even with a score in the mid-range for that school, they wanted only higher scores in their accepted students. With then all going test-optional, the average ranges for standardized test scores was much higher last year. I would not submit unless the score is over the 50th percentile.

This makes no sense to me. Are you saying they saw the score but wanted it removed so they wouldn't have to include it in their average? If that's what happened, wow, how unethical can you get? This is actually newsworthy.

+1, that is truly shocking to me.

Does this happen at public schools or only private schools? I am also shocked.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think the admissions staff below Ivy tier honestly don’t want your scores if they’ll bring down the school average for rankings. Ivys+ I think will hold it against you. Just my guess.

I think you're right. Here's one little anecdote from our experience last year. DS, who went to a local DC very rigorous private, had an SAT score that was at the 50th percentile for a SLAC that was a reach--not far reach--but reach. He had a great interview and great recommendations and average GPA for the school. The day before they were mailing out decisions, the school called my son's college counselor and said, "it would be in his best interest to change his application to test optional." He hopped onto his portal and clicked the box to change from submiting his score to not, and was accepted the next day. Even with a score in the mid-range for that school, they wanted only higher scores in their accepted students. With then all going test-optional, the average ranges for standardized test scores was much higher last year. I would not submit unless the score is over the 50th percentile.

This makes no sense to me. Are you saying they saw the score but wanted it removed so they wouldn't have to include it in their average? If that's what happened, wow, how unethical can you get? This is actually newsworthy.

+1, that is truly shocking to me.

Does this happen at public schools or only private schools? I am also shocked.

The school clearly isn't elite.

[Anonymous]

The above seems bizarre to me. So if the counselor hadn't answered the phone, the kid wouldn't have gotten in?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here, our schools are not highly competitive for top students. I have an average student who wants to get into the safeties of top students. Still, their scores are at the low end but still within the middle 50%. No one seems to know what to tell us. In reality it probably doesn’t matter if she submits or not because I will second guess myself if she doesn’t get in either way.

Wow, I could have written your post, word for word! This describes my kid to a T and we're in the same boat, not knowing what to do about test scores.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Parent of senior here, 1st kid.

where is this "conventional wisdom" found ???? CONVENTIONAL is mentioned by both OP and the next poster.

Please be specific. Like, this website or that book or none of the above -- our $$$$ private counselor told us this. Or the counselor in our giant public school system who's been doing this 20 years.

Our kid attends a private DC school and we have very responsive, engaged counselors for that tuition. BUT ... but but but. They definitely don't offer these kind of concrete, universally understood nuggets like "submit yes if > 75%. No submit if <50% and gonzo GPA."

There is not real conventional wisdom because this is only the second class of kids to face this dilemma.

And the first class where kids have plenty of opportunities to take the standardized tests. 2021s were limited by covid.

No one is talking about lack of opportunity to take the test. We're talking about smart kids who aren't good standardized test takers who could take a test every month and still not improve their score.

[Anonymous]

Here's another question: if the applicant goes test optional, but still wants the school to know s/he did well on certain subscores, could they report that in the "additional information" area? Or is that not allowed?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Parent of senior here, 1st kid.

where is this "conventional wisdom" found ???? CONVENTIONAL is mentioned by both OP and the next poster.

Please be specific. Like, this website or that book or none of the above -- our $$$$ private counselor told us this. Or the counselor in our giant public school system who's been doing this 20 years.

Our kid attends a private DC school and we have very responsive, engaged counselors for that tuition. BUT ... but but but. They definitely don't offer these kind of concrete, universally understood nuggets like "submit yes if > 75%. No submit if <50% and gonzo GPA."

There is not real conventional wisdom because this is only the second class of kids to face this dilemma.

And the first class where kids have plenty of opportunities to take the standardized tests. 2021s were limited by covid.

No one is talking about lack of opportunity to take the test. We're talking about smart kids who aren't good standardized test takers who could take a test every month and still not improve their score.

Follow along, many 2021s did not have any test scores to report because of COVID cancellation. This application cycle is the first year applicants will only be choosing not to submit because of bad scores at most schools.

[Anonymous]

I wouldn’t label them bad scores. We’re talking about kids within range at top schools wondering if they should send in their 45th percentile scores.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I wouldn’t label them bad scores. We’re talking about kids within range at top schools wondering if they should send in their 45th percentile scores.

Again, please read op who definitely did not ask that, op asked if below 25 percent mark. In any case, the point remains that 2021 data not likely indicative of what admissions offices might do this year because there was an additional reason besides performance for not submitting last year that does not exist this year.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I wouldn’t label them bad scores. We’re talking about kids within range at top schools wondering if they should send in their 45th percentile scores.

Again, please read op who definitely did not ask that, op asked if below 25 percent mark. In any case, the point remains that 2021 data not likely indicative of what admissions offices might do this year because there was an additional reason besides performance for not submitting last year that does not exist this year.

OP here and you’ll see I actually asked about 25-35%. Those are within the 50% range.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here, our schools are not highly competitive for top students. I have an average student who wants to get into the safeties of top students. Still, their scores are at the low end but still within the middle 50%. No one seems to know what to tell us. In reality it probably doesn’t matter if she submits or not because I will second guess myself if she doesn’t get in either way.

We are in the same boat. Applying to a "safety" university but SAT scores are in the 25-50% range for the engineering school, which is where DC is applying. To further complicate, 40% of admitted engineering students last year did not submit scores, so is that 25-75 range really reflective of the students they admit? Who knows?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you are from a UMC background and aren't submitting scores, that will not work in your favor.

How will admissions know if the student is from
an UMC background?

FAFSA
Common App responses
Democgraphics of the high school
and if the school is small enough, google

What do you mean by the last point?

If they have time to google the parents and research aspects that might help determine the kid's background.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP here, our schools are not highly competitive for top students. I have an average student who wants to get into the safeties of top students. Still, their scores are at the low end but still within the middle 50%. No one seems to know what to tell us. In reality it probably doesn’t matter if she submits or not because I will second guess myself if she doesn’t get in either way.

We are in the same boat. Applying to a "safety" university but SAT scores are in the 25-50% range for the engineering school, which is where DC is applying. To further complicate, 40% of admitted engineering students last year did not submit scores, so is that 25-75 range really reflective of the students they admit? Who knows?

You don't understand what a "safety" is. A school where your kid's SATs are in the 25-50 range is NOT a safety for your kid.