New York, NY & Iowa City, IA—ACT and the College Board today are releasing new concordance tables that allow users to compare scores from the new SAT test (redesigned in 2016) and the ACT test. The 2018 ACT/SAT concordance tables, derived from a joint comprehensive research study conducted by the two organizations over the past nine months, are based on scores of nearly 600,000 graduating seniors in the class of 2017 who took both tests.
ACT and the College Board, with engagement from the NCAA technical committee, periodically produce concordance tables to assist in comparing scores of students who may complete different tests. The ACT and the SAT measure similar but not identical content and skills, and they employ different score scales. The ACT Composite score is based on a scale of 1 to 36, while the SAT Total score ranges from 400 to 1600. Both the ACT and SAT are accepted at all colleges and universities in the US.
The concordance tables are designed to be used by colleges, K12 education professionals, scholarship organizations, students, policymakers and others to inform policies, processes and decisions. They may be used to compare SAT and ACT scores across different students, to establish policies using comparable scores from both tests and to convert scores for use in a predictive model or index. Both ACT and the College Board have consistently advised that test scores should be used in combination with other factors—including grades—in making important decisions such as admissions.
The 2018 ACT/SAT concordance tables are now the only official concordance tables between the ACT and the SAT and should be used as the single source of reference moving forward when comparing scores on the two tests. These tables replace the concordance tables that were released in 2016.
The new concordance tables may be accessed for free on both the ACT (www.act.org/concordance) and the SAT (www.collegeboard.org/concordance) websites.
