Whether you’re a college hopeful or the parent of one, today’s blog post brings you essential info about an aspect of SAT, Digital SAT, and ACT prep that not everyone knows how to use! In addition to Super Scoring, Score Choice is another evolution to the standardized testing process that you may not have heard about. It’s one that can really work in your favor….if you know how to work it! So, with my pointy test prep wizard hat on, I’m going to get back to basics and help you understand how it works.
Article Contents
1. What Is ACT and SAT Score Choice?
2. Why Is Score Choice Offered?
3. Which Colleges Allow Score Choice?
4. Conclusion
What Is ACT and SAT Score Choice?
Score Choice gives you the option to send only the scores from SAT or ACT test dates that you want a college to see with your application—meaning you do not have to show admissions committees the scores that aren’t to your liking!
Let’s consider a common tale: you take the SAT multiple times because you want to generate as high of a Super Score as possible. Maybe you take the SAT in March, May and in June. In March, you reached your highest Math score. In June, you finally got the Reading and Writing scores you wanted. However, the May test was not so hot. In fact, you got the LOWEST section scores in May in BOTH sections! You were feeling sick, or distracted by a fight with a friend….whatever the cause, you flubbed it big time.
Enter Score Choice. Because of this option, you can opt to send ONLY your March and June scores to the colleges on your list...while pretending that May never happened.
Why Is Score Choice Offered?
On the surface, Score Choice appears like it’s merely an act of great kindness, handed down from the testing gods to relieve the mere mortals (i.e. nervous test-takers). After all, if you never have to send that score from the day you bombed, what’s there to be nervous about in the first place, right?
But….maybe it seems a bit suspicious to you that the College Board and ACTStudent.org are being so generous.
Your spidey sense is not wrong. Like most developments in the SAT and the ACT, this actually benefits THEM, too.
Back in the day, before Score Choice came along, you would ask the College Board to “send your scores” to X University. You’d pay one fee, and then ALL your test scores that you ever took with the College Board (SAT I, the now-discontinued SAT IIs, etc.) would all be sent over to that college. Yes, this sucked if you had a not-so-hot test day, but at least there was a simplicity to it—and you only had to pay a single fee.
NOWADAYS, if you want to send three different test date scores—but bury that one test date where you bombed—you’ll pay a fee to send the first one, then a separate fee to send the second score, then a third fee to send the third score. You WON’T pay a fourth fee because...you didn’t WANT to send THAT score, remember?
So at the end of the day, Score Choice allows the SAT and ACT to collect double and triple the score submission fees!
Which Colleges Allow Score Choice?
Though the trend is that more and more colleges allow Score Choice, you still need to research each and every school on your college list to be sure. There are still several colleges that “require all scores” or “recommend sending all scores.” With all this lingo, what’s the difference?
Generally, if a school says they “recommend” that you send all scores... just send the ones that benefit you. Treat this like Score Choice. “Recommending” is NOT the same as “requiring,” after all. Plus, why pay an extra fee to submit a score you don’t actually WANT the college to see in the first place?
If, on the other hand, the college “requires” that you send all scores—just do what they say and send them all. My ACT/SAT tutoring students often protest here: how will they “know” if you did or not?...especially if YOU’RE paying for each score that gets sent, and the college isn’t in charge of pulling the score...seriously, how will they know?
But I just have a bad feeling about rolling the dice in this case (and hey, my knowledge and intuitions have been getting great results for my students well for nearly a decade and a half). If a college goes out of its way to state that they require something, you should do that something. Who knows how the colleges and the College Board and ACTStudent.org might share info amongst themselves! And if you ever got caught NOT sending a required score, your application would definitely get rejected. I, personally, would NOT want to risk it! And when I’m advising a student in this arena, we don’t take that chance.
So that's everything you need to know about Score Choice!
Now you’re ready to complete another step of the test prep journey! As always, if you find this situation overwhelming, you’re welcome to bring me your personal college quest and I’ll start assembling your personal test prep map FOR you…so you can snag the treasure chest that is admission to your dream school.
