Does your SAT really matter?
Saw multiple points about it online with opinions split between “yes it matters as they can judge your analytics thinking and how well you perform under pressure” and “nobody even asked me about it during any interviews at any point in my career”. An acquaintance of mine is an investment banking analyst at J.P. Morgan and his relatives mentioned the constant questions about the SAT during his summer recruiting cycles. I have a 1450 SAT currently with 750 math and 700 English. (Trying to increase it as English is my second language) For context, the score is out of 1600 (used to be like 2400 but that was like 7 years ago I think), 1450 puts me in the 99th percentile according to the official source of the test. I would love to hear any opinions or examples from people who went through their recruiting cycles.
I only ever had it asked in application questions. I got a 1350 (91% percentile for that year) and it did not affect any first round interviews on my end. I’m guessing it’s just another filter like GPA
I guess we will see when I start my recruiting. What jobs were you applying for if you don’t mind me asking?
For quant it might matter
Definitely not looking for quant, but equity research, IB, and PE are what I’m looking towards mostly
Consulting and hedge funds care. IB won't
Do they have a certain score cutoff? I’m assuming I will not be putting 1450 on my resume, but if they ask and I tell them my score, would I be looked at negatively?
You have it reversed
Will they ever actually check? In a background check, they’re going to reach out to previous employers/school, but are they really going to check with college board? Couldn’t you just “forget” what you got and put a 1500?
HH/PE/HF will ask for it. IB could go either way. More important for non targets in buy side recruiting as a sanity check to show they could have gone to a target
GPA > SAT. Firms worth their salt will have tests that test you in the present rather than an exam that people prep for. They also will likely do personality assessments.
That’s what I assumed, but after hearing about his recruiting cycle I was a little surprised. Being at Wharton and assuming that he had high GPA I was confused why a lot of places asked for SAT…
Yes, it matters, but not a huge amount. Lots of HFs ask for it. But for most employers, it is one factor among many to screen for intellectual chops. I've only heard of a hard cutoff once: during an interview process some time ago, I was told that only candidates scoring over 2350 were considered for this PM's team. And I was also compelled to take an IQ test for this same seat, so SAT was not the sole determining factor.
Overall, I don't feel it is inappropriate to ask about SAT. Not a perfect measure of intelligence by any means, but despite all the anti-test propaganda/politics out there, an individual's SAT score is, in fact, highly correlated with general intelligence assessments (citation below):
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6963451/
"SAT scores correlated up to 0.8 with measures of fluid reasoning ability and g, and as highly with traditional intelligence test scores as scores on those tests did with each other. Frey and Detterman established that the SAT (and, with Koenig, the ACT) was g-loaded, could be used as a proxy measure for intelligence, and could be converted to an IQ scale with a simple equation"
"Contrary to some opinions, the predictive power of the SAT holds even when researchers control for socioeconomic status, and this pattern is similar across gender and racial/ethnic subgroups [15,16]. Another popular misconception is that one can “buy” a better SAT score through costly test prep. Yet research has consistently demonstrated that it is remarkably difficult to increase an individual’s SAT score, and the commercial test prep industry capitalizes on, at best, modest changes [13,17]."
Thank you for the clarification, I guess my main question is whether 1450 is good enough when asked to provide…
Reiciendis illo odio distinctio vel ab iusto. Non odio et qui ut est fuga ut repudiandae.
Alias repellendus mollitia sunt quas sequi mollitia est voluptas. Qui ipsum necessitatibus aut sit. Consequatur voluptas nesciunt qui optio unde voluptatem.
Ullam at laudantium quidem iure. Excepturi nobis sunt iure laborum a perspiciatis. Nam quo magni quasi sint dignissimos debitis vitae non. Quia quia perferendis delectus rerum aut aut quaerat.
Aspernatur explicabo sed laboriosam sed velit. Voluptatem animi suscipit quod distinctio autem.
See All Comments - 100% Free
WSO depends on everyone being able to pitch in when they know something. Unlock with your email and get bonus: 6 financial modeling lessons free ($199 value)
or Unlock with your social account...