High SAT vs High ACT

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I thought they tested the same stuff. Does the ACT favor students who do better on the verbal side? That definitely describes my kid.

From this article: https://www.usnews.com/education/best-colleges/articles/act-vs-sat-how-to-decide-which-test-to-take

“The two exams may appeal to different types of students, says Jumamil. A key difference is that students with a strong English background ‘may flourish on the ACT,’ which puts more emphasis on verbal skills, she says, while for students who are strong in math, ‘the SAT may reflect that much better.’”

I find all of this interesting but the generalizations in the OP don't make sense to me. At my kid's HS, ACT isn't really considered by students. Everyone just assumes they should take the SAT, so those kids very well could have gotten high scores on the ACT but just never took it.

Right...it may be that OP heard this but it's certainly not a widely held belief. DCPS pays for the SATs (and I believe most public schools around here pay for the SATs) for all students so kids around here are more likely to focus on the SATs. In the midwest, public schools are more likely to pay for/offer the ACTs for all students. So there are certain tests that tend to dominate in some regions. Over time, that regional dominance has waned somewhat , due to the belief that some kids do better on one or the other (so some kids will take the test not offered by their public school) but there is zero evidence that one is "easier" than the other.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I thought they tested the same stuff. Does the ACT favor students who do better on the verbal side? That definitely describes my kid.

From this article: https://www.usnews.com/education/best-colleges/articles/act-vs-sat-how-to-decide-which-test-to-take

“The two exams may appeal to different types of students, says Jumamil. A key difference is that students with a strong English background ‘may flourish on the ACT,’ which puts more emphasis on verbal skills, she says, while for students who are strong in math, ‘the SAT may reflect that much better.’”

I find all of this interesting but the generalizations in the OP don't make sense to me. At my kid's HS, ACT isn't really considered by students. Everyone just assumes they should take the SAT, so those kids very well could have gotten high scores on the ACT but just never took it.

It would be interesting to know what region of the country you’re in, because the data shows that this would be unusual outside of the Northeast. In the 80’s, everyone I knew took the SAT, because that’s what the elite colleges required, but that has changed steadily over time. I’m familiar with several very different parts of the country right now, and all of the HS students I know who are seriously into the college application process have taken both and then focused on prepping for a retake of the one they did best on (even if they had a very high score the first time).

This is probably true for UMC kids...but most public school kids focus on the test their school offers for free.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Most kids find the ACT easier.

+ 1. ACT is much easier. In fact, what I heard is non-intellectual students submits ACT because they cannot get a high SAT score.

Source?

An admissions officer at a college in the 20-40 range.

Well, whoever that is she's not an expert. And what exactly is a "non-intellectual" student?

[Anonymous]

Anxious helicopter parents on here handwringing over which test their anxious kids should take. Newsflash: there's no clear answer, and you're not gonna find one. Just take both and be done with it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Most kids find the ACT easier.

+ 1. ACT is much easier. In fact, what I heard is non-intellectual students submits ACT because they cannot get a high SAT score.

Source?

An admissions officer at a college in the 20-40 range.

Well, whoever that is she's not an expert. And what exactly is a "non-intellectual" student?

Right, and what I "heard" (from a friend) is that admissions officers are suspicious of SAT scores because it's easier to get accommodations from the College Board than from the ACT...all of this is equally ridiculous. Admissions officers have to look at the two tests the same because they are offered with different frequencies in different parts of the country. Their official policies is that there is no preference...so they cannot prefer one over the over.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There are various concordance tables published and they aren’t uniform.

There is only one current official concordance table, available on both ACT and College Board websites. There are older ones out there, on other websites, but they are not current.
https://www.act.org/content/dam/act/unsecured/documents/ACT-SAT-Concordance-Information.pdf
https://collegereadiness.collegeboard.org/pdf/guide-2018-act-sat-concordance.pdf

You think a 2018 concordance table is current, never mind accurate?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There are various concordance tables published and they aren’t uniform.

There is only one current official concordance table, available on both ACT and College Board websites. There are older ones out there, on other websites, but they are not current.
https://www.act.org/content/dam/act/unsecured/documents/ACT-SAT-Concordance-Information.pdf
https://collegereadiness.collegeboard.org/pdf/guide-2018-act-sat-concordance.pdf

You think a 2018 concordance table is current, never mind accurate?

If it's put out by the testing agencies (and hasn't been updated), why wouldn't it be accurate?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There are various concordance tables published and they aren’t uniform.

There is only one current official concordance table, available on both ACT and College Board websites. There are older ones out there, on other websites, but they are not current.
https://www.act.org/content/dam/act/unsecured/documents/ACT-SAT-Concordance-Information.pdf
https://collegereadiness.collegeboard.org/pdf/guide-2018-act-sat-concordance.pdf

You think a 2018 concordance table is current, never mind accurate?

If it's put out by the testing agencies (and hasn't been updated), why wouldn't it be accurate?

It is means to show ADs the relative academic levels of those taking each test because people used to only take one or the other. I doesn't and can't factor in the reality that some kids are better taking one test or the other. My DC's SAT score concordance would suggest the ACT score should have been 4 points high than it actually was. It isn't meant to be an individual performance predictor.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There are various concordance tables published and they aren’t uniform.

There is only one current official concordance table, available on both ACT and College Board websites. There are older ones out there, on other websites, but they are not current.
https://www.act.org/content/dam/act/unsecured/documents/ACT-SAT-Concordance-Information.pdf
https://collegereadiness.collegeboard.org/pdf/guide-2018-act-sat-concordance.pdf

You think a 2018 concordance table is current, never mind accurate?

It is the only table created by a joint study between ACT and College Board. It is the only table that has any hope of being accurate, from a standardized, statistical perspective.

Now, if you want to consider colleges' perspectives, then look at the score ranges published by the individual colleges, which may differ.

Beware of older tables out there. College Board put out a table in 2016 that was based on a very limited study, when it first issued the Redesigned SAT. Not valid anymore. There are also a number of random websites referencing the really old tables, from around 2009. Often these websites don't even realize that they've linked up to super old data.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There are various concordance tables published and they aren’t uniform.

There is only one current official concordance table, available on both ACT and College Board websites. There are older ones out there, on other websites, but they are not current.
https://www.act.org/content/dam/act/unsecured/documents/ACT-SAT-Concordance-Information.pdf
https://collegereadiness.collegeboard.org/pdf/guide-2018-act-sat-concordance.pdf

You think a 2018 concordance table is current, never mind accurate?

If it's put out by the testing agencies (and hasn't been updated), why wouldn't it be accurate?

It is means to show ADs the relative academic levels of those taking each test because people used to only take one or the other. I doesn't and can't factor in the reality that some kids are better taking one test or the other. My DC's SAT score concordance would suggest the ACT score should have been 4 points high than it actually was. It isn't meant to be an individual performance predictor.

I agree with this. My kids scored wildly different between the tests. However, the concordance table may be helpful for students, especially juniors, trying to figure out which of their scores is "better," when trying to decide which test to focus prep on going forward. However, I would suggest to seniors, with testing all done and scores already in hand, to look at their colleges' published data to decide about whether and which to submit.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Anxious helicopter parents on here handwringing over which test their anxious kids should take. Newsflash: there's no clear answer, and you're not gonna find one. Just take both and be done with it.

Or just take one and be done with it?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Anxious helicopter parents on here handwringing over which test their anxious kids should take. Newsflash: there's no clear answer, and you're not gonna find one. Just take both and be done with it.

Or just take one and be done with it?

Sure. Take one if you're not anxious. Take both if you are. But obsessing over which is better? That's only for the insanely and irrationally anxious.

[Anonymous]

And be thankful your kid is actually able to choose or to take a test at all unlike many in the Class of 2021.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Anxious helicopter parents on here handwringing over which test their anxious kids should take. Newsflash: there's no clear answer, and you're not gonna find one. Just take both and be done with it.

Man you are cool. I would pay big money to subscribe to your newsletter. Please leave some chicks for the rest of us though.

[Anonymous]

I think it’s pick your poison. If your kid has fast processing speed probably ACT is better since questions are more straight forward if your kid is more of a slower but appreciates higher level critical thinking go with SAT.

My DD “enjoyed” the SAT format better so we went with that. She’s actually a very fast reader but the ACT format was too exhausting. She scored mid 1400s. Since she put no effort into ACT (only one practice test) we have no idea which one she would have done better with ultimately. Her scores were high enough for what she wanted.