Should I Take the SAT at the Beginning of Senior Year?

[Euphoriet]

Is there any way I would be affected if I took the SAT at the very beginning of my senior year?.. would my chances of applying to colleges be gone that year?...

Is there really any reason why I should not take it then?

 

[franznietzsche]

Its better to take it sooner, that way you can take it again if you don't do as well as you'd like. HOwever you can take it as late as december and it will still be accepted (at least that was the cut off for every where i applied). BUt you should take it at least once during your junior year and then again sneior year.

 

[Euphoriet]

Aside from not being able to take it twice.. is there any other reason?

 

[Xasuke]

Nope, taking it your senior year is fine otherwise. You won't be weighted for being older or anythin.g

 

[Leaping antalope]

My recommendation is that take the SATI in when you are in 11th grade, (in May or June) then take SATII subject tests in your senior year. Because SATI only involves verbal and math, which can be done by almost all high school students. However, SATII subject tests are harder and students will usually need to finish his 11th grade to be able to answer the questions. Because you have only 3 chances in your senior year (October/November/December) , you'd better finish SATI first, and take SATII in October. Tests in November and December are just in case that you did not do a good job in your previous tests.

 

[Lyuokdea]

After going through this last year, I would definitely recommennd getting rid of the SAT I's during your junior year and taking the SAT II's at the earliest possible time in your senior year, if you don't do that and end up with a november or december sat II date, it will be a mess to get all the information into colleges on time, usually it takes about 6 weeks after you take the test for it to actually show up at the college, and the college usually wants the sat by january 1st, so making sure it gets there on time and the score that gets there is the one you want, etc. adds a lot of stress to what will already be the most stressful weeks of high school

~Lyuokdea

 

[Euphoriet]

My plan was to take the ACT before I took the SAT1... and give that a try to see how I did. I am not really sure if Ivy league schools take
the ACT in place for the sat1 like many schools do though.. does anyone know how it works?

Plan was
Take ACT , IF results were good I would not take SAT1 just sat2s
else, really get ready for the sat1 and do my best on that and not send the bad act scores (but I would be taking at least 3 tests within the same time period).

 

[Leaping antalope]

Usually on the college applicatoin forms, it will ask you to fill in the SAT scores OR ACT scores. So, I think we get to choose which to tests to take. In my case, I only took SATI and SATII tests...

 

[Entropy]

Dude, take it your junior year. Get the SAT atleast done by then, ACT is a good idea too. You don't want a bad score and not have time to get a better one. Plus you want to send in you're college application as soon as possible. The later you send it in, the more competetive it will be and the lower chance you will have of being accepted.

 

[Euphoriet]

Yes ... I thought about it.. and I will probably allow myself time to take it alteast twice.

 

[relskid]

personally, taking the SATs during my senior year was the worst. with all the college applications and senior projects, studying for the SATs was just a major time killer. my advice to you is to take them in your junior year, that way you can find out how you did, and if you didn't do as well as you'd hoped, you can study over the summer and take them first thing senior year.

 

[Moonbear]

Some colleges do rolling admissions, which means the first applications in get first consideration. The sooner you have all your scores in, the better chance of consideration. They won't fill the class until the deadline, to leave room for some outstanding students who may apply late. If you're applying to one of those schools, it will put you at a slight disadvantage to send in a later application. For those that wait until all the applications are into begin making decisions, it won't make any difference as long as your scores are available by the deadline.

 

[Andromeda321]

I first took the SAT in my junior year so I would have ample time should I choose to do so (the same with my SATIIs, in case I wanted another score in a particular topic). And I really did need those few months in my senior year to retake them! Also everyone will tell you that the best way to practice for the SAT is to actually take it so what's it going to hurt you to do them once (or twice) junior year?