CATES Blog

What is Score Choice? What is Super Scoring? What’s the difference?

When you are taking the SAT exam many hours go into studying and preparing for the exam.  You take mocktests, work on practice problems, and formulate your perfect strategy to beat the test. Then you take the SAT test and, for many people, the work ends here. Don’t be one of these people. You still have a couple strategies you can consider.

One of them is Score Choice.  The College Board, the company that creates and administers the SAT, allows you to implement Score Choice if you so choose.  Essentially, Score choice allows you to elect which SAT score you can submit to colleges.  If you take the SAT multiple times, Score Choice enables you to select your best score and submit that score, and that score alone, to colleges.  There are some schools that require you to submit all your test results and your college counselor will know which ones, but Score Choice allows you, whenever possible, to put your best foot forward.

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Should I take the SAT again? When do I know if I am done?

The SAT exam is a long and arduous process and one which most people feel can’t end soon enough.  After long hours of study, countless mock tests, and the stress of the unknown, retaking the SAT can seem like the absolute last thing you want to do.  Once you’ve received your SAT scores you have a choice to make. Am I satisfied with how it went or do I want another crack at the test?

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What is the best way to keep track of time on the SAT Test?

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Should I omit questions on the SAT test?

Any good athlete or coach knows that you don’t go into a big game without a great strategy. You practice hard, eat and sleep well, and walk onto the field on game day with a proven playbook. When it comes to the SAT Test, omitting a question represents one of the best “plays” you can run. Proven fact: Omitting questions raises your SAT test score.

Success in omitting comes down to knowing when to do it, and at CATES we advise a pretty aggressive approach. The multiple choice questions on the SAT Test feature five answer choices. While some people say you should guess if you can eliminate one of these five, you should probably opt to omit when you cannot eliminate three of the five answer choices on a given SAT Test question. At CATES, we have discovered with our students that omitting according to this “rule of three” can sometimes make the difference between a score of 590 and one of 610. At the higher end of the scale in the Critical Reading, for example, one question could be the difference between a 760 and an 800!

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How is the SAT test scored? What is the system of additions and deductions that the College Board uses?

After you study for months, then fill out bubbles for hours, and finally wait for weeks to hear back, the College Board finally gives you your reward…a number. Your SAT test score may feel slightly anti-climactic and not like the greatest gift to receive for all your hard work – but as of right now the College Board has got nothing else to give you. So how do they come up with the SAT Test score?

Since March of 2005, The College Board has scored the SAT test out of a total of 2400 points. Prior to that, they scored the SAT Test out of 1600. Each section of the SAT – Critical Reading, Math, and Writing – can count for between 200 and 800 points. The sum of the scores from each of these sections comprises the composite score for the SAT Test.

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