My daughter bombed her ACT - move on to SAT?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I posted earlier recommending a tutor. The thing is, a tutor is necessary to figure out the strategies and to go over the wrong answers her so she can see what she did wrong. The tutor will provide your daughter with strategies on how to approach certain questions, and what to look for. My DS had a 33 in his mock tests as a rising junior. After a few months of tutoring, he took the test in February and scored a 35. The tutor will help your DD improve her score significantly, especially the lower scores. It is a worthwhile investment.

This is a great example illustrating why the ACT and SAT are of limited value for colleges and why the Harvard lawsuit will fail.

Exactly. High scores have reduced value because they can be bought and/or made into an extracurricular activity.

+1

That is why schools with holistic admissions can see who probably aid for their higher test scores.

Those of you referring to "paying for" scores-- do you mean, paying for prep courses?

I'll say "yes", and I'll plead guilty to doing it for my own kids. What I won't do is claim that they are somehow being victimized because DD's 1570 doesn't impress Harvard.

Exactly, when it's clear how much the scores can be influenced, it's clear they aren't intrinsic to the kid, and so they can't settle anything. Of course there are high scoring kids who are rejected all over the place, and there are lower scoring kids that land spots at any given dream school. The score doesn't have to be bought, it can be increased by selfstudy, but it still doesn't mean the individual has been transformed as the score improves.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The Internet offers many self-managed ACT/SAT prep courses. Frankly, if she cannot direct her efforts to locate and learn the tutorials on her own, she will likely struggle in a rigorous university curriculum.

Do your kids know what a bitch you are? Way to be positive and add something productive.

The OP said she was getting higher on the pre tests she took. And a 30 is not a bomb. It was her first try. It is people like you that make this kid feel like she bombed. The kids who can afford private tutors always come out on top, right?

White rich people are such pretentious assholes. Just because you have tons of money and time to throw away until your kids get perfect scores, does not mean the rest of the population does. Check yourself.

This was actually good advice - what is WRONG with you?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The Internet offers many self-managed ACT/SAT prep courses. Frankly, if she cannot direct her efforts to locate and learn the tutorials on her own, she will likely struggle in a rigorous university curriculum.

Do your kids know what a bitch you are? Way to be positive and add something productive.

The OP said she was getting higher on the pre tests she took. And a 30 is not a bomb. It was her first try. It is people like you that make this kid feel like she bombed. The kids who can afford private tutors always come out on top, right?

White rich people are such pretentious assholes. Just because you have tons of money and time to throw away until your kids get perfect scores, does not mean the rest of the population does. Check yourself.

This was actually good advice - what is WRONG with you?

Yes, this is very good advice. Mom and Dad will spend thousands to raise the test scores with endless prep classes, and yes, Trevor and Catharine will receive admissions from the Ivies. Fast forward 8 months, and both students are struggling because Mom and Dad cannot purchase enough tutors to help them with the daily challenges of a demanding program.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The Internet offers many self-managed ACT/SAT prep courses. Frankly, if she cannot direct her efforts to locate and learn the tutorials on her own, she will likely struggle in a rigorous university curriculum.

Do your kids know what a bitch you are? Way to be positive and add something productive.

The OP said she was getting higher on the pre tests she took. And a 30 is not a bomb. It was her first try. It is people like you that make this kid feel like she bombed. The kids who can afford private tutors always come out on top, right?

White rich people are such pretentious assholes. Just because you have tons of money and time to throw away until your kids get perfect scores, does not mean the rest of the population does. Check yourself.

This was actually good advice - what is WRONG with you?

Yes, this is very good advice. Mom and Dad will spend thousands to raise the test scores with endless prep classes, and yes, Trevor and Catharine will receive admissions from the Ivies. Fast forward 8 months, and both students are struggling because Mom and Dad cannot purchase enough tutors to help them with the daily challenges of a demanding program.

Any kid that can score close to 36 on the ACT or 1600 on the PSAT is not going to struggle at these schools. You have to have basic raw intelligence and a good basic grounding in education to ace these tests.
In fact it is very difficult to improve a 34 or 35 on the ACT. But it can be done, and tutoring is the best way. The lower scores are much easier to improve.

Plus the chances of them being admitted to an ivy are still slim. They will need to show academic rigor and success in that curriculum. AND they will need to show some sort of sustained leadership in something amazing. And even then it is a crap shoot! That said, Harvard is no more difficult in curriculum than some of the other top 20 schools. It just has more brand recognition.

I posted earlier about my DC scoring a 36, but he is not interested in any of the super elite schools, mainly because he does not like the culture. He'll find his place, and it will only be easier for him to do so because of that amazing score!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The Internet offers many self-managed ACT/SAT prep courses. Frankly, if she cannot direct her efforts to locate and learn the tutorials on her own, she will likely struggle in a rigorous university curriculum.

Do your kids know what a bitch you are? Way to be positive and add something productive.

The OP said she was getting higher on the pre tests she took. And a 30 is not a bomb. It was her first try. It is people like you that make this kid feel like she bombed. The kids who can afford private tutors always come out on top, right?

White rich people are such pretentious assholes. Just because you have tons of money and time to throw away until your kids get perfect scores, does not mean the rest of the population does. Check yourself.

This was actually good advice - what is WRONG with you?

Yes, this is very good advice. Mom and Dad will spend thousands to raise the test scores with endless prep classes, and yes, Trevor and Catharine will receive admissions from the Ivies. Fast forward 8 months, and both students are struggling because Mom and Dad cannot purchase enough tutors to help them with the daily challenges of a demanding program.

No it isn't good advice, it's just a smug smack down. Working with a high quality tutor and learning to attack a challenge quickly and smartly may be a better preparation for getting along in college than the suggestion to just go off by yourself and read the internet already. There are resources in college that are important to utilize: professors, fellow students, writing labs. Good collaboration speeds individual learning, but some students have always managed on their own and are pigheaded about working with others. It's important to do both. Studying for an ACT is a good time to realize this, because the real skill that needs to be ramped up (knowing the quirks of this one test) becomes useless as soon as that score is attained. Finding the right person to work with can be the most rewarding way to do this. It doesn't have to be high cost, it could be a friend group. Regardless, saying anyone who didn't do it by themselves is doomed to fail is silly. The only real goal is to get the best score with the least effort because there are much more significant things to focus on. Unfortunately, being wealthy is not a disadvantage.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I posted earlier recommending a tutor. The thing is, a tutor is necessary to figure out the strategies and to go over the wrong answers her so she can see what she did wrong. The tutor will provide your daughter with strategies on how to approach certain questions, and what to look for. My DS had a 33 in his mock tests as a rising junior. After a few months of tutoring, he took the test in February and scored a 35. The tutor will help your DD improve her score significantly, especially the lower scores. It is a worthwhile investment.

This is a great example illustrating why the ACT and SAT are of limited value for colleges and why the Harvard lawsuit will fail.

Exactly. High scores have reduced value because they can be bought and/or made into an extracurricular activity.

+1

That is why schools with holistic admissions can see who probably aid for their higher test scores.

Those of you referring to "paying for" scores-- do you mean, paying for prep courses?

I'll say "yes", and I'll plead guilty to doing it for my own kids. What I won't do is claim that they are somehow being victimized because DD's 1570 doesn't impress Harvard.

Exactly, when it's clear how much the scores can be influenced, it's clear they aren't intrinsic to the kid, and so they can't settle anything. Of course there are high scoring kids who are rejected all over the place, and there are lower scoring kids that land spots at any given dream school. The score doesn't have to be bought, it can be increased by selfstudy, but it still doesn't mean the individual has been transformed as the score improves.

Agreed. The kid who gets a really high score by making standardized testing into an extracurricular activity doesn't impress me any more than the kid who reaped the benefits of a top-flight tutor. And Harvard should not have to defend itself from the sanctimonious parents of either of these two kids.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I posted earlier recommending a tutor. The thing is, a tutor is necessary to figure out the strategies and to go over the wrong answers her so she can see what she did wrong. The tutor will provide your daughter with strategies on how to approach certain questions, and what to look for. My DS had a 33 in his mock tests as a rising junior. After a few months of tutoring, he took the test in February and scored a 35. The tutor will help your DD improve her score significantly, especially the lower scores. It is a worthwhile investment.

This is a great example illustrating why the ACT and SAT are of limited value for colleges and why the Harvard lawsuit will fail.

Exactly. High scores have reduced value because they can be bought and/or made into an extracurricular activity.

+1

That is why schools with holistic admissions can see who probably aid for their higher test scores.

Those of you referring to "paying for" scores-- do you mean, paying for prep courses?

I'll say "yes", and I'll plead guilty to doing it for my own kids. What I won't do is claim that they are somehow being victimized because DD's 1570 doesn't impress Harvard.

Exactly, when it's clear how much the scores can be influenced, it's clear they aren't intrinsic to the kid, and so they can't settle anything. Of course there are high scoring kids who are rejected all over the place, and there are lower scoring kids that land spots at any given dream school. The score doesn't have to be bought, it can be increased by selfstudy, but it still doesn't mean the individual has been transformed as the score improves.

Agreed. The kid who gets a really high score by making standardized testing into an extracurricular activity doesn't impress me any more than the kid who reaped the benefits of a top-flight tutor. And Harvard should not have to defend itself from the sanctimonious parents of either of these two kids.

I think those who are posting this stuff have kids who also bombed the ACT test. Sorry but if you have a high score, it opens a lot more doors whether you want to believe it or not. My kid is not interested in ivy league, but he will certainly have access to a lot of amazing schools with his high score.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Most public universities do not superscore. .

Completely untrue:

https://blog.prepscholar.com/which-colleges-superscore-the-sat

Well my child is looking into engineering at bigger public universities and most of them don’t. Wisconsin, Purdue, WVU, UT - Texas, Purdue, Wyoming, Arizona State, Alabama, The Ohio State, etc....

My kid is looking at Purdue as well. They will look at the highest subscores across all test dates. Essentially, they superscore but don’t call it that.

It was asked at a Purdue local visit session (1.5hrs long) last weekend that there is no longer rolling admissions, EA is Nov 1st, and to only submit your highest SAT or ACT as they do not super score. Right from the director of admissions mouth.

That’s interesting. I emailed an admissions counselor from Purdue and was told that they look at the highest subsections across multiple sittings of the same test. They do not however recalculate a new composite score.

NP here whose dc is also looking at Purdue. This is on Purdue's website: "We will always use the best available score for admission decisions and scholarship consideration and will not penalize you if earlier scores were lower." I have to admit this is sort of vague. Certainly nothing about superscoring.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I posted earlier recommending a tutor. The thing is, a tutor is necessary to figure out the strategies and to go over the wrong answers her so she can see what she did wrong. The tutor will provide your daughter with strategies on how to approach certain questions, and what to look for. My DS had a 33 in his mock tests as a rising junior. After a few months of tutoring, he took the test in February and scored a 35. The tutor will help your DD improve her score significantly, especially the lower scores. It is a worthwhile investment.

This is a great example illustrating why the ACT and SAT are of limited value for colleges and why the Harvard lawsuit will fail.

Exactly. High scores have reduced value because they can be bought and/or made into an extracurricular activity.

+1

That is why schools with holistic admissions can see who probably aid for their higher test scores.

Those of you referring to "paying for" scores-- do you mean, paying for prep courses?

I'll say "yes", and I'll plead guilty to doing it for my own kids. What I won't do is claim that they are somehow being victimized because DD's 1570 doesn't impress Harvard.

Exactly, when it's clear how much the scores can be influenced, it's clear they aren't intrinsic to the kid, and so they can't settle anything. Of course there are high scoring kids who are rejected all over the place, and there are lower scoring kids that land spots at any given dream school. The score doesn't have to be bought, it can be increased by selfstudy, but it still doesn't mean the individual has been transformed as the score improves.

Agreed. The kid who gets a really high score by making standardized testing into an extracurricular activity doesn't impress me any more than the kid who reaped the benefits of a top-flight tutor. And Harvard should not have to defend itself from the sanctimonious parents of either of these two kids.

I think those who are posting this stuff have kids who also bombed the ACT test. Sorry but if you have a high score, it opens a lot more doors whether you want to believe it or not. My kid is not interested in ivy league, but he will certainly have access to a lot of amazing schools with his high score.

Congratulations to your kid, but you are saying your theory is untested. Opening doors as in merit aid, yes. Opening all doors, no. Putting too much stock in scores is a trap. A friend's child had a perfect SAT and near perfect grades in challenging courses, but was turned down by ten schools (only one ivy) because they were over confident--will be going to their state flagship with honors with some merit aid, their only option. Kid is satisfied, parent is steamed and feeling guilty. Sounds like you are smarter about how to put good scores to use, but there are in fact kids who bombed (if bombed is a 30) who would beat out your kid in admissions.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I posted earlier recommending a tutor. The thing is, a tutor is necessary to figure out the strategies and to go over the wrong answers her so she can see what she did wrong. The tutor will provide your daughter with strategies on how to approach certain questions, and what to look for. My DS had a 33 in his mock tests as a rising junior. After a few months of tutoring, he took the test in February and scored a 35. The tutor will help your DD improve her score significantly, especially the lower scores. It is a worthwhile investment.

This is a great example illustrating why the ACT and SAT are of limited value for colleges and why the Harvard lawsuit will fail.

Exactly. High scores have reduced value because they can be bought and/or made into an extracurricular activity.

+1

That is why schools with holistic admissions can see who probably aid for their higher test scores.

Those of you referring to "paying for" scores-- do you mean, paying for prep courses?

I'll say "yes", and I'll plead guilty to doing it for my own kids. What I won't do is claim that they are somehow being victimized because DD's 1570 doesn't impress Harvard.

Exactly, when it's clear how much the scores can be influenced, it's clear they aren't intrinsic to the kid, and so they can't settle anything. Of course there are high scoring kids who are rejected all over the place, and there are lower scoring kids that land spots at any given dream school. The score doesn't have to be bought, it can be increased by selfstudy, but it still doesn't mean the individual has been transformed as the score improves.

Agreed. The kid who gets a really high score by making standardized testing into an extracurricular activity doesn't impress me any more than the kid who reaped the benefits of a top-flight tutor. And Harvard should not have to defend itself from the sanctimonious parents of either of these two kids.

I think those who are posting this stuff have kids who also bombed the ACT test. Sorry but if you have a high score, it opens a lot more doors whether you want to believe it or not. My kid is not interested in ivy league, but he will certainly have access to a lot of amazing schools with his high score.

My kid got a 1570 on the SAT and spent $800 on prep. The high score opened doors for sure. But it didn't open ALL doors...nor should it. And yet you have people who think it should open all doors, learn that it does not, and then decide to sue Harvard. That's BS.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I posted earlier recommending a tutor. The thing is, a tutor is necessary to figure out the strategies and to go over the wrong answers her so she can see what she did wrong. The tutor will provide your daughter with strategies on how to approach certain questions, and what to look for. My DS had a 33 in his mock tests as a rising junior. After a few months of tutoring, he took the test in February and scored a 35. The tutor will help your DD improve her score significantly, especially the lower scores. It is a worthwhile investment.

This is a great example illustrating why the ACT and SAT are of limited value for colleges and why the Harvard lawsuit will fail.

Exactly. High scores have reduced value because they can be bought and/or made into an extracurricular activity.

+1

That is why schools with holistic admissions can see who probably aid for their higher test scores.

Those of you referring to "paying for" scores-- do you mean, paying for prep courses?

I'll say "yes", and I'll plead guilty to doing it for my own kids. What I won't do is claim that they are somehow being victimized because DD's 1570 doesn't impress Harvard.

Exactly, when it's clear how much the scores can be influenced, it's clear they aren't intrinsic to the kid, and so they can't settle anything. Of course there are high scoring kids who are rejected all over the place, and there are lower scoring kids that land spots at any given dream school. The score doesn't have to be bought, it can be increased by selfstudy, but it still doesn't mean the individual has been transformed as the score improves.

Agreed. The kid who gets a really high score by making standardized testing into an extracurricular activity doesn't impress me any more than the kid who reaped the benefits of a top-flight tutor. And Harvard should not have to defend itself from the sanctimonious parents of either of these two kids.

I think those who are posting this stuff have kids who also bombed the ACT test. Sorry but if you have a high score, it opens a lot more doors whether you want to believe it or not. My kid is not interested in ivy league, but he will certainly have access to a lot of amazing schools with his high score.

Congratulations to your kid, but you are saying your theory is untested. Opening doors as in merit aid, yes. Opening all doors, no. Putting too much stock in scores is a trap. A friend's child had a perfect SAT and near perfect grades in challenging courses, but was turned down by ten schools (only one ivy) because they were over confident--will be going to their state flagship with honors with some merit aid, their only option. Kid is satisfied, parent is steamed and feeling guilty. Sounds like you are smarter about how to put good scores to use, but there are in fact kids who bombed (if bombed is a 30) who would beat out your kid in admissions.

It is called yield protection. Those tippy top white rich kids with perfect grades at schools that inflate and perfect test score aren’t what schools always want. They are everywhere, especially in certain areas (NY, Boston, and DC Metro) They want passionate kids who are leaders who get some B’s but take the absolute rigorous courses. Gritty kids. Ones who have athletics or other EC’s and still get decent grades. Recommendations are key. Teachers know whose kids have had it easier. They personally fight for some and write okay recs to others. Interviews are important too. We saw many kids in our private get into schools where higher kids did not. It is not always fair, but the big schools and private ones have more input on who they can admit. State schools look more at test scores and GPA over everything else. We had one kid not get into UMD but got into 3 top 25 schools because they look holistically.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Most public universities do not superscore. .

Completely untrue:

https://blog.prepscholar.com/which-colleges-superscore-the-sat

Well my child is looking into engineering at bigger public universities and most of them don’t. Wisconsin, Purdue, WVU, UT - Texas, Purdue, Wyoming, Arizona State, Alabama, The Ohio State, etc....

My kid is looking at Purdue as well. They will look at the highest subscores across all test dates. Essentially, they superscore but don’t call it that.

It was asked at a Purdue local visit session (1.5hrs long) last weekend that there is no longer rolling admissions, EA is Nov 1st, and to only submit your highest SAT or ACT as they do not super score. Right from the director of admissions mouth.

That’s interesting. I emailed an admissions counselor from Purdue and was told that they look at the highest subsections across multiple sittings of the same test. They do not however recalculate a new composite score.

NP here whose dc is also looking at Purdue. This is on Purdue's website: "We will always use the best available score for admission decisions and scholarship consideration and will not penalize you if earlier scores were lower." I have to admit this is sort of vague. Certainly nothing about superscoring.

Very vague - that's why I wrote to the admissions office as well. They gave me the same answer as PP above (bolded).

[Anonymous]

The ‘holistic approach’ results in reverse discrimination, a discrimination as ugly and antithetical to the basic principles of equal protection and due process as those practiced for centuries.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The ‘holistic approach’ results in reverse discrimination, a discrimination as ugly and antithetical to the basic principles of equal protection and due process as those practiced for centuries.

Weh?????

[Anonymous]

OP: Some good advice here.

1) Have her retake. She can "superstore" her 2 tests. Have her work on her lower scoring sections.

2) Did she use the big red book of ACT tests? If not, have her take one every other weekend at the library before taking the test again.

3) Many schools don't even care about the Science section. Some schools outright only look at the Math and English sections.

4) Without extra practice, your DD may actually score *higher* on the SAT. They are very similar tests (after the recent redesign). But you won't know this if she never takes it.

The consensus over at College Confidential and elsewhere (see the Applerouth Website) is that the new SAT is much harder than the ACT. The concordance published by the College Board is way off and will be revised this Summer. See the following thread among others:

https://talk.collegeconfidential.com/sat-act-tests-test-preparation/1890397-sat-concordance-table-compare-old-and-new-sat-scores-p43.html

The next to last post is this:

FWIW, my D19 just got her ACT score from a 2/27 test date. She had already taken the Nov SAT and gotten a 1430 (EBRW 720, math 710) so the concordance tables say a 31 would correspond on the ACT. She didn't do any significant ACT prep and only took it because it was administered to all juniors by the school during the school day. So we were pleasantly shocked today when her ACT score came and she has a 35 Composite (also 35 in all areas). She took both tests with accommodations and without the essay.