Claremont McKenna College recently announced that it had been sending inflated SAT scores to US News since 2005.

According to news accounts, the vice president and dean of admissions admitted inflating the scores and resigned. The college’s critical reading scores were inflated by an average of 17 points and the math scores were bumped up by an average of 10.5 points.   Here is where you can find a detailed explanation of the manipulation.

Other Colleges Being Deceitful

Claremont McKenna is hardly the only school that has fudged, or in some cases, falsified its numbers. Baylor University, for instance, essentially bribed its incoming freshmen one year into retaking the SAT. The freshmen were already admitted to Baylor so there was no reason to revisit the test. Baylor’s stunt, which managed to boost the school’s average SAT score by 10 points, triggered a huge outcry.

The U.S. Naval Academy was embarrassed when it became public that its applicant rejection rate wasn’t nearly as high as the institution was reporting. At an industry conference, a Clemson University administrator shared a laundry list of ways that her institution was manipulating its figures to boost its college rankings. What prompted gasps from the audience was the administrator’s observation that Clemson rated all other schools in US News’ survey as below average to make it look better.

Schools also falsify the number of their full-time faculty. I did a story in 2009 for my college blog at CBS MoneyWatch that illustrated that schools, in this case the most elite of institutions, gave US News the wrong figures on the percentage of its faculty who were full-time. Here is an excerpt:

You can read my entire post here:  Are Ivy League Schools Fudging Their Numbers?

Despite what US News, which isn’t even a magazine anymore, might suggest, colleges and universities are on the honor system when submitting data.  In a New York Times article yesterday, Robert Morse, who heads up US News’ rankings operation, said he has a team of four to six people reviewing the data. Hmmmm. Really Bob? Really?

Here’s the Real Scandal

In my opinion, the biggest news isn’t that schools are obsessed with looking better in the rankings, but what the rankings have done to our higher-ed system. In pursuit of rankings glory, schools across the country have adopted policies about how they spend their money, whom they admit, and what kind of financial aid they distribute that have negatively impacted millions of American families. Now that’s the real scandal!

I’ll write more about this tomorrow.

Lynn O’Shaughnessy is the author of The College Solution and She also writes a college blog for  CBSMoneyWatch and US News. Follow her on Twitter.

Join Me at My College Workshop on Saturday!

There are a few slots left for the college workshop that I will be  holding at the University of California, San Diego this Saturday (Feb. 4). At the Finding the Right College Workshop, you will learn specific strategies to increase your child’s admission chances, ways to evaluate colleges and universities, essential ACT and SAT information and what you need to know about  college rankings.

You can learn more here and sign up for the workshop here.

SAT Testing Strategy: Use SAT Score Choice

Until last year, students who took the SAT had to turn in all their SAT scores to schools where they were applying. So if students had a bad SAT math section on one test and did far better on the SAT math section on the next, it didn’t matter. They had to submit all their scores.

Not anymore. Through Score Choice, students can designate which SAT test date they want to submit. They can’t, however, cherry pick subcategories to submit. Here’s an example of what I’m talking about:

Let’s say in March a teen got this SAT score:

• Reading 600
• Math: 620
• Writing: 600

In May the teen got these SAT results:

• Reading 650
• Math: 600
• Writing: 600

The teenager can’t submit the SAT reading score from May and the SAT math score from March. You have to pick either the March or May sitting. In this case, the student would send the March scores. If Score Choice won’t help, the next SAT strategy should.

SAT Testing Strategy: Ask if College Cherry Picks Test Scores.

Many colleges have insisted that Score Choice isn’t necessary because they cherry pick SAT test scores for students.

Let’s say that in two different testing periods you got composite scores of 1790 and 1820. But if you used the best subcategories between those two SAT tries, your composite score would inch up to 1840. Many schools will cherry pick the best category scores for you because they want to use the highest numbers possible when they release their published scores. It makes a school’s incoming freshmen class look smarter.

So ask a school how it would formulate your SAT results before you decide whether to submit one or more rounds of SAT test scores.

ACT Testing Strategy: Cherrypicking ACT Test Results.

Last fall I wrote about an ACT testing strategy called superscoring that can boost your overall test score. Increasing  ACT scores by superscoring could put teenagers in a better position to gain admission to some schools or capture fatter financial aid packages or merit scholarships.

Test Strategy:  Don’t assume your SAT or ACT scores are too low.

The biggest admission factor for most schools is a student’s grade point average and the strength of the student’s high school courses. SAT and ACT scores typically rank below that. When in doubt, ask a college how important these test scores are.

Her are links to my other SAT and ACT test tips:

Should You Take the SAT or ACT Test?

Can Guessing Boost Your ACT or SAT Test Scores?

How to Survive Bad SAT or ACT Scores

Lynn O’Shaughnessy is the author of The College Solution, an Amazon bestseller and she also writes a college blog for CBSMoneyWatch. Follow her on Twitter.

Here’s good news: There are successful SAT and ACT test strategies that students can use to improve their scores or limit the damage from earning lousy test scores.

During the next few days, I’ll be sharing daily SAT prep tips and here’s the first one:

Strategy No. 1: Take a Practice SAT or ACT

You will have a better idea of how your child will far on the SAT, if he or she takes a warm-up SAT. A student can take a sample SAT test anytime on the College Board website.

You can find free ACT questions here. And for $19.95, you can have access to ACT Online Prep for a year, which includes practice ACT tests.

After taking a practice SAT test, students can receive their scores immediately. A student will see how he or she fared on each type of question and category.

Here’s another idea: Try the PSAT, which is the baby SAT test that students can take as early as their sophomore year in high school.

High schools administer the PSAT to juniors, but some schools also allow 10th graders to take the test. Ask your school what its policy is.

Tomorrow: Assess Your Child’s SAT and ACT Test Taking Skills

Lynn O’Shaughnessy is the author of The College Solution and she also blogs about college for CBSMoneyWatch.

No worries. You can find lots of them right here at TheCollegeSolutionBlog.com and each weekend I also provide the links to the college posts that I write over at CBSMoneyWatch.com.

Here are my CBS stories from the past week:

Top Colleges to Cut Big Aid Packages?

In general, elite colleges offer phenomenal financial aid packages. If you can get into a school like Swarthmore and Princeton, you’ve won the educational lottery. But, as you’ll see, these incredibly generous policies might be disappearing.

Why Millionaires’ Kids Earn Better SAT Scores

I was surprised by this one. I knew affluent students performed better on the SAT than low-income kids, but I didn’t realize how even a $20,000 boost in income can impact a teen’s SAT scores!

How Does Your Teen’s SAT Scores Compare?

I wrote about the release of the latest batch of SAT scores. This blog also provides a link to individual state scores.

Lynn O’Shaughnessy is the author of The College Solution.

What is the average ACT score?

For 2009 high-school graduates, the average ACT score was 21.1, which is identical to last year’s number. The ACT, which measures English, math, science and reading, uses a scale of 1 to 36.

The average ACT score remained the same even though a record 1.48 million students — 4% more than last year — took the test. You can visit the ACT’s website to learn more about the national ACT scores, as well as how students performed on the ACT in individual states.

So what about average SAT scores? As far as I can tell, the College Board hasn’t released 2009 figures so I’m providing the average SAT scores from last year:

Average (Mean) SAT Scores

• Critical reading: 502
• Mathematics: 515
• Writing: 494

The top SAT score you can earn in each of those categories is 800.

Since the SAT and ACT are scored so differently, students, who take the ACT and SAT, often don’t know which scores are better.  My daughter faced the same dilemma when she was in high school. No worries though. I  wrote a previous post that will help you compare ACT and SAT test scores.

Also, on my CBSMoneyWatch.com college blog, I also provide a ACT/SAT conversion table entitled, Which Test Scores to Send: SAT or ACT.

Lynn O’Shaughnessy is the author of  The College Solution, an Amazon.com bestseller.

Is Harvard Going Broke?

If you’ve been struggling to stay on a budget, you might appreciate what’s happening at Harvard, which is experiencing the worst financial crisis of its 373-year history.

The Soaring Popularity of College Student Loans

Back in the mid 1990s, the majority of college students did not take out college loans to pay for their degrees. Let me state the obvious: that’s no longer the case.

Parents Taking the SAT

I’m relieved that I can’t remember my SAT scores from long ago, but I know my math score was atrocious. Thank goodness I was a journalism major. Find the link here to take a mini SAT quiz designed for parents.  After you finish it, you might appreciate what your child has to do to prepare for the 190 questions in the SAT test that takes nearly four hours.

Learn more about college by reading my book, The College Solution:  A Guide for Everyone Looking for the Right School at the Right Price and by visiting my college blog archive.