Third-take worries

purplelion

hey y'all, hope you're enjoying the holidays and not freaking out too much about this massive wait for the dec score! long story short: dec was my third take; i got mid-160s on my first and low 170s on my second. i'm increasingly worried that i'm going to score at or below my first score. if that happens, how much will it hurt my applications? i've found a lot of posts online about multiple takes when you improve, but not much about improve-then-drop, and i figure there's other people out there wondering about something similar. any insight is much appreciated!

pritisharma

I am not in this situation but I would think unless you really messed up (which I really doubt) you should be fine if you are "in your range" . Since they count your highest score generally. In all likelihood you are having a case of pre-result-jitters.

Jonathan Wang

Two answers:

1. Probably won't hurt you much in the aggregate. Most schools have a policy of only considering your highest score, so if you assume adcoms adhere to stated policy they just won't use a lower score. It'll hurt you for the very few schools that average.

2. I could have said anything in #1, and it wouldn't matter because this is a completely irrelevant thought process. You can't cancel anymore, you can't retake for another year at least, the score isn't leaving your record, and it's not like you were planning to half-ass your apps if you happened to score well (right?). Just put your best foot forward in your apps, let the chips fall where they may, and make decisions once you have more complete information. You'll kill yourself fretting about things you can't change or predict.

Pacifico

Highest score is the score. You can pretty much throw out Y just for retaking but everywhere else will take that low 170 (or higher) and go with that. You can't change anything you've done so just get your apps on point and you'll be fine.

Pacifico

Absolute worst case scenario you just write an addendum to explain a terrible score, but it is more than likely that you won't need to.

purplelion

thanks y'all! that's reassuring to hear. i think the longer the wait is, the easier it is to overthink things and stress out, but as you said, at this point what's done is done, and there's no use in spending more time worrying. just gonna focus on the rest of the app and enjoying sunday

purplelion

ended up with a 170! about halfway between my first and second takes. would've saved myself a world of stress if i had taken it easier the past few days, but hey, i'm human. thanks again for the wisdom and comments - they definitely helped!