With so much riding on your SAT scores, from college acceptances to scholarship money, you want to make sure your SAT scores are as strong as possible. When colleges superscore the SAT, it is a great way for your scores to truly take off and help you unlock coveted opportunities in the future.

Once you learn all about superscoring and find out which colleges use this strategy for reviewing SAT scores, you will be able to use superscoring to your advantage when preparing for the SAT.

What is superscoring?

Superscoring occurs when colleges and universities look at the highest score for each SAT section across all of the SAT administrations you take rather than a single test date.

For instance, maybe you have taken the SAT twice, earning a 700 on the Math section and a 600 on the Reading and Writing section the first time and earning a 660 on the Math section and a 660 on the Reading and Writing section the second time around.

A school that does not superscore the SAT will consider your second test because your composite score at 1320 is higher than your original composite score of 1300. While having a high composite score is great, this means that you will not get a chance to let your original score of 700 on the Math section shine.

Schools that superscore the SAT offer the best of both worlds: a higher composite score and a chance to show off high section scores as well. A school that uses superscoring will consider the highest score from each section, taking the 700 in Math from your original test and the 660 in Reading and Writing from your second test, giving you a composite score of 1360.

That’s a win in our book!

Considering how beneficial superscoring is for students, many people wonder why colleges use this scoring process in the first place. What’s in it for them? Although superscoring is great for applicants, it is also useful for colleges. You get to have colleges consider a higher SAT score and colleges get to report that the students they accept have higher SAT scores. It’s a win-win scenario.

As such, there are quite a few colleges and universities that choose to superscore the SAT. It is important to research the specific scoring policies for your prospective schools so you can approach your SAT administrations strategically.

Colleges that superscore the SAT

Here is a list of some of the most popular colleges and universities that superscore the SAT:

• Ball State University
• Boston College
• Boston University
• Brown University
• Colorado College
• Columbia University
• Cornell University
• Dartmouth College
• Duke University
• Emerson College
• Florida State University
• Georgetown University
• Georgia Institute of Technology
• Harvard University
• Indiana University
• James Madison University
• Johns Hopkins University
• Kenyon College
• Massachusetts Institute of Technology
• Morehouse College
• New York Institute of Technology
• New York University
• Northeastern University
• Northwestern University
• Notre Dame University
• Ohio State University
• Ohio Wesleyan University
• Princeton University
• Purdue University
• Seattle University
• Southwestern University
• Stanford University
• University of Chicago
• University of Cincinnati
• University of Colorado Boulder
• University of Miami
• University of Michigan
• University of North Carolina
• University of Pennsylvania
• US Air Force Academy
• US Coast Guard Academy
• US Military Academy
• US Navy Academy
• Vanderbilt University
• Vassar College
• Villanova University
• Virginia Tech University
• Xavier University
• Yale University

You can also check out this exhaustive list of schools that superscore the SAT as well as other schools that use alternative score practices from the College Board.

Using superscoring to your advantage

Once you know whether or not the colleges on your list superscore the SAT, you can use this information to your advantage.

Here are a few different strategies to keep in mind if you are applying to schools that use superscoring:

Take the SAT more than once

While it is always a good idea to take the SAT multiple times anyway, this is especially important if the colleges you are considering will superscore your test results. There’s no point in taking the SAT once when you have the opportunity to study after receiving your test results and potentially earn a higher score on either or both sections of the SAT on your next attempt.

Although you do not want to take the SAT an excessive amount of times, taking the test three or four times to lock in your highest possible scores will help you in the long run.

Prep for one section at a time

If your SAT is not superscored, you will want to be careful that you don’t spend so much time working on improving your score for one section that you neglect a section that you scored highly on and lose points on that section on your next test attempt.

However, with superscoring, this concern doesn’t matter.

You can actively choose to pour all of your time and effort into focusing on earning a great score on one section without devoting too much energy to the other section at all.

Say, for instance, you have already reached your target score for the SAT Math section, but you need to improve your SAT Reading and Writing score by a few points. Instead of dedicating time to both sections out of fear that you won’t improve your Reading and Writing score or that your Math score will slip, you can spend all of your time focused on boosting your Reading and Writing score knowing that your SAT Math score is already secure.

When you use superscoring to your advantage, you can boost your composite SAT score and increase your chances of getting into the colleges and universities on your list.

Increasing your SAT score

It is important to remember that superscoring, while beneficial, is not a golden ticket to a high composite SAT score. It won’t matter if the colleges and universities on your list superscore the SAT if you aren’t earning a good score on the SAT Math or SAT Reading and Writing sections when you take the SAT.

In order to take full advantage of the benefits of SAT superscoring, you will need to do well on each section of the SAT throughout the course of your SAT test administrations.

Prep Expert can help.

When you enroll in a SAT prep course or sign up for online, private SAT tutoring, you will gain the strategies and skills necessary to do well on both sections of the SAT. All of our classes are led by master instructors and all of our tutors scored in the 99th percentile on their own standardized tests. With Prep Expert, you’ll know that you are in good hands, and you will learn everything you need to know in order to reap the benefits of superscoring. 

Prep Expert has helped over 50,000 students reach their SAT goals, and you can be next. 

Learn more about Prep Expert or sign up for private SAT tutoring or a SAT prep course today when you visit our website.