What’s a National Merit Scholar?

If you know anything at all about the PSAT, then the current conservative media hysteria charging the elite Virginia high school with “withholding announcement” of National Merit awards makes no sense at all. Before I heard about this brouhaha, I knew 90% of everything about the PSAT. Figuring out how to explain that this hysteria is absurd  required me to learn the other 10%, which I’ll now share with you, dear readers.

The PSAT is formally known as the PSAT National Merit, Scholarship Qualifying Test, or PSAT/NMSQT. Back in the dark ages, from 1959 to some point in the 19990s,  the test had a legitimate function as an initiation to the SAT proper. Juniors took the PSAT and seniors took the SAT in October, which was SAT Day. By the time I began tutoring in 2002, “SAT Day” had already moved back to March of junior year, per College Board recommendation. Before the pandemic, competitive students began taking the SAT much earlier in their junior year. So as a practice test, the PSAT long ago lost its utility.

The real value of the PSAT comes from its association with the National Merit awards.  Originally, the Scholarship Qualifying Test was a different entity that identified top students as semifinalists,  who then “confirmed” their SQT score with an SAT. But tests are expensive to write, so in 1971 the two organizations joined forces and the PSAT became the qualifying test.

National Merit qualification is the PSAT’s reason for existence these days. For students, qualification permits recognition that has otherwise been erased from the modern era–and by modern, I don’t mean the current post-Floyd “tests are bad” phase but going back to the 80s or even earlier. All you need for National Merit recogntion is a  really high PSAT test score that puts you in the top 1% of all testers. The SAT has no equivalent. There’s no official SAT 1600 Club, no “Top 1% Score” label students can include in their CV.

So a major point of the PSAT–arguably its only real value–is to identify the top 1% and giving them bragging rights. Since Asian immigrants and months or years of prep broke the tests, the labels aren’t as impactful as they once were. But to Asians, they are particularly important because the scores can’t be gamed by state discrimination. While states with high Asian populations have higher cut scores, the scores themselves are the only way to play. No one is culling out Asians or making them meet a higher standard. The single standard is so essential to the National Merit qualification that, rather than change this, a national recognition category was defined for the lower scoring ethnicities.

If, as I claim, that’s the primary feature of the PSAT, one might wonder why other kids not in the top 1% would bother taking the PSAT at all, given the wide range of SAT test prep and the complete lack of value the PSAT has in their lives. Hard truth: Most kids are only taking the PSAT to provide a decent-sized mountain for the winners to sit atop.

To keep the PSAT tradition alive despite the fact that the nearly three hour tet has little benefit for the other 96%, the College Board gives complete control to high schools.  Students don’t register for the PSAT with the College Board (as they do for the SAT). High schools administer and own the PSAT. They decide what day to run the test (Tuesday or Saturday). They decide if the test will be limited to their students or if they will sell seats to kids from other schools. They decide whether or not they will require their students to take it.The scores and notifications are sent to the schools, not the students–these are precisely the circumstances that created the TJ hysteria currently in the news. While the SAT registration fee increases almost every year, the PSAT is just  $18–very affordable to states who might want to pick up the tab.

In short, we still have the PSAT because the College Board uses the National Merit awards  to increase their cachet and in exchange gives control and affordability to high schools, who have various reasons for wanting their student population to take college admissions tests, from bragging rights about national merit to ensuring they aren’t missing bright unmotivated kids to..whatever, I haven’t gamed out all the advantages. Otherwise, it’d be long gone.

The essential category achievement in National Merit  ranking is “semifinalist”.

National Merit Semi-finalists are, roughly, those receiving the top 1% of PSAT scores. Designation isn’t an exact science, because the finalists are apportioned by state. Different states have tighter (California, Virginia) or looser (South Dakota) cut scores, but it’s basically the top 1%.

Most semifinalists go on to be finalists.  Not all do–for example, I was a semi-finalist whose school didn’t even bother to tell me there was paperwork to apply for the next step because my GPA was a 3.3 and I had something like 4 Ds so didn’t have a shot at finalist. But most.

The scholarships themselves aren’t all that big a deal. There are three categories of scholarships: NM corporate, NM university, and National Merit itself. Awards are far more subjective. The corporate scholarships are usually limited to students whose parents are employees, or living in a particular region. The university scholarships aren’t even offered by most schools but are used by less prestigious schools to offer full-rides to smart kids if they commit. The NM-sponsored scholarships are for $2500. So not that much money and–crucially–determined in late spring, long after college offers have been made. No application gloss factor.

So for all practical purposes, semi-finalists are the ball-game. They’re declared in September, and are a pretty reliable indicator that the student was in the 99th percentile for his state.

Prior to the TJ story, that’s what I knew.

The TJ story has various iterations but makes this charge:

Last fall, along with about 1.5 million US high school juniors, the Yashar teen took the PSAT, which determines whether a student qualifies as a prestigious National Merit scholar. When it came time to submit his college applications this fall, he didn’t have a National Merit honor to report — but it wasn’t because he hadn’t earned the award. The National Merit Scholarship Corporation, a nonprofit based in Evanston, Illinois, had recognized him as a Commended Student in the top 3 percent nationwide — one of about 50,000 students earning that distinction. Principals usually celebrate National Merit scholars…

To those of us generally familiar with the PSAT, there are two unfamiliar terms that immediately jump out: Commended Student and National Merit scholar.

The other fact that jumps out is the 3%. Remember, semi-finalist is top 1%.  So Commended Student is way downstream from the only important category. Basically, a participation trophy. I thought the term might be relatively new, but I found mention of it going back 30 years, so it’s not new–just unimportant. In fact, I think my own son must have qualified and DAMN NO ONE TOLD ME EITHER.

Then I dug into “National Merit Scholar” and learned that it is the formal term for kids who make it all the way through to a scholarship from the organization.  No one uses the term “National Merit Scholar” for anything less. And as I said, the actual scholarship winners aren’t as big a deal as the semi-finalists, which is why I hadn’t heard the term. (On the Advanced Placement side, AP Scholar has far more significance.) Here’s a University of South Florida campus celebrating the presence of eight National Merit Scholars on campus. USF Petersburg gives each student a full ride on tuition and board in exchange for the student openly committing to the school. This is not a list of semifinalists, even, as can be seen by the declaration of major.

So again: Semi-finalist status is coin of the realm. Commended is also-ran, Finalist is status too late to matter, Scholar is more status too late, but also some money.

So that’s nearly 1300 words on the National Merit and PSAT.

In Part II, I’ll explain why the l’affaire TJPSAT is not just nothing, but a really embarrassing nothing. Hint: everyone retweeting this story either genuinely thinks or is perpetuating a lie “commended” is “scholar”.

Post-Pandemic Update

This is me:

Wednesday morning my phone rang and instead of the usual “scam likely” (thanks, T-Mobile!) it was the medical center. I picked up, apolozing to my class for taking the call but I was having surgery soon.

“You have been assigned a surgery time tomorrow at 11:00 am.”

“Tomorrow? No, Friday.”

Pause. “Uh, no. December 22nd.”

I went to my google calendaar. For Thursday it  says “Surgery.”  For six weeks I have been telling everyone, including myself, that my surgery is on Friday.

“Um. Could we schedule it later in the day?” The scheduler is very nice and promises to call back.

“Your surgery is tomorrow? Will we be able to finish our final?” I don’t know why Ahmad is concerned about anything; I’m the fool who doesn’t know what day my surgery is. My answer is forestalled by the phone again, it’s the scheduler with an offer of 1:00.

“Oh, that’s perfect. Thanks so much.” Thursday was a half day and half days end at 12:30. I’m about 20 minutes away from the medical center. Plus, no covid test! My record is pure.

“OK, guys, it’s good. I’ll be here tomorrow. Just have to jet out at 12:30 when school ends.”

“School ends at 1:30 tomorrow.”

“What?”

“Yeah, it’s some new schedule.” This is the 9th half day this year.

“Fucking fucking fuck.Ignore me.” Just as my calendar said Thursday, the posted bell schedule says school ends tomorrow at 1:30 for the first time in thirty years. I have to get coverage for fourth block.

So I go see the principal’s secretary to confirm procedure. Teachers accrue ten days a year. I’ve been teaching for 14 years and have 120 days. Time off is rare and I usually screw it up so I check with her first.

“Yes, you have to enter an absence record, no sub, get coverage.”

“Why an absence record?”

“You’ll be gone for three hours.”

I look at her. “Tomorrow’s a whole day?”

“No, but you’re contractually obligated to be here until 3:30.”

“This campus will be a ghost town at 1:30. In fact, the only person who would be here tomorrow after 1:30 would be me, if I weren’t going to be gone.” (I’m routinely at school until 6 or 7.)

“Doesn’t matter.”

Fuck that. I enter an absence record of an hour. If she wants to prove I’m not here, she can wait around.

For teachers, there’s a big difference between contractually obligatated hours and actual time worked. You can’t shift the hours. All the extra hours in the world don’t get teachers out of contract hours. I get that. But this is bullshit. Probably the most irritating part is that the secretary knows full well how rare my absences are and how jackassed it is to tell someone who’s never absent that the bill will be for three hours instead of one.

Anyway. I get coverage and in the process notify several other teachers that we’re out at 1:30. Wasn’t just me who didn’t know. That, at least, is comforting.

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You might think that since I’m never absent,  I might be intolerant of kids taking time off. Or you could more accurately conclude that people who mangle their own surgery dates are tolerant of all sorts of hiccups.  But this year has taken a toll on my approach.

The first post-pandemic year the problem was first-bell tardies. We had literally 300 or more kids showing up more than 15 minutes late every day. I’d have fourteen kids out of a class of thirty by the tardy bell, and four kids still missing after 30 minutes.

This year, the tardies are limited to five or six kids, but the absentee rates are stratospheric.I’m not fussy about occasional absences. But I have thirteen students with more than twenty unexcused absences thus far, out of 77 days in school, and most of them had excused absences as well: mental health days (two a month. really.), flu, covid, monthlong trips to India. Three kids didn’t bother to show up for finals. Another kid said “I’m going on vacation next week so I won’t be here. What can I do to make up the work?” Nothing, I said. You’ll probably fail the class.

I told one girl the first week of school to drop precalc when she explained she’d had to leave early every day to go to a college class (I still don’t know how this was allowed). She didn’t. Then she had a crisis with her mother’s health. Then her car got totaled. And in between all these absences, she took her two mental health days every damn month and then, after promising to be in class, spent three days in a row talking to her counselor. Then complained when she got a D, which was a gift. (Great Roger Sweeney joke: Student asks why she got a D. Teacher says because I like you.)

Sing me no sad songs about kids’ emotional health. Most of them are fine. But even if some of them are not, the batshit tolerance is just begging for exploitation, and getting it good and hard.

School’s wonderful. I’ve been so busy I haven’t had time to write, plus the Mounjaro tends to wipe me out (22 pounds! although it’s a lot more expensive now).  But this year has been even more joyful than last, when just being in the classroom again was a jolt of happiness, masks notwithstanding.

Achievement is up. Last year my trig and algebra 2 classes were hideously behind as these were kids who’d had two years of cheating with photo-math. This deficit is reflected in my precalc class, which is just….not fun. The juniors are ready to go, but the seniors are comatose. My algebra 2 class has by far the worst absenteeism–nine of the +20 absences are in this class–but the rest of the kids are good to go. Not quite up to pre-pandemic skills, but well on their way. I’m teaching a freshman algebra class for the first time since my traumatic all-algebra year of terrors and it’s marvellous. Terrific students, hardworking, ready to face the world.  Another thing: last year, most kids wore basically pjs to school. Way more jeans this year.

It was harder to see the division in abilities and mindsets last year, but I’m centering on the view that the middle of the bellcurve kids who spent a couple years of high school in remote and are now seniors were the worst hit. The top kids are still on the ball and kept activities going during the pandemic (I ran five clubs pandemic year to aid in this, plus my usual stuff), but kids who were just planning on community college anyway and had no resumes to worry about found it pretty easy to skate by. I’m seeing mostly the top half of the bellcurve of those who spent middle school in the pandemic, but they seem to be doing very well. Yes, I know what NAEP scores say, but people are stupid about NAEP anyway. I’ll yell about that later.

My worst enemy wouldn’t call me a hardass teacher, but I am not aligned with the current obsession with student mental health. Get your ass back to class, kids. (And don’t say “OK Boomer” to anyone born in the early sixties. It REALLY pisses us off. Early gen boomers got free love, the Beatles, and cheap college. We got disco, HIV, AIDS, stagflation and a far more competitive job market.)

We’re supposed to be doing these SEL lessons every week. I did one. Said “This is stupid.” My advisory class of sophomores agreed so we didn’t do them anymore.

When my TA told me he’s still covid+ after two weeks off, I say “then don’t take the damn test. Lie. What the hell. Get back here.”….and well, not entirely kidding.

But generally, I’m having a blast. It’s good to be back. Most kids are doing great, world. Stop worrying.

Surgery is for arthritis. I’m a bit nervous.