College Admissions Counseling Blog

I was recently made aware that several highly selective colleges are now combining ACT sub scores from different tests to create a super score like is down with the SAT. The colleges are Washington University in St. Louis and Amherst College. With the increasing popularity of the ACT exam in the traditional SAT areas of the East and West coast the significance of super scoring can be significant. If these two colleges are starting to super score their ACT reported scores will increase and put pressure on other colleges to also start using super scoring for the ACT. If this occurs then the average ACT scores reported by these colleges will increase which will make it appear that the college's test scores are higher than they really are.

I general discuss with the students I counsel the advantages and disadvantages of the ACT and SAT. One of the advantages of the SAT, relative to the ACT, was the super scoring that occurs at most colleges. Now it appears that that advantage may be going away. More and more it is becoming important for students to understand each of the exams to determine which is a better choice for their needs.