Where did you hear that scores will be released 11/8?

Scores are up!

Hmm… I am not seeing scores. Anyone else who can see theirs on a 504? Also, shows that my student’s test as a “scheduled event” in blue versus a “completed event” in green

Just want to make sure I’m not missing anything. If my kid was in the 99 percentile for reading and math. With all As last year, that should translate to a 900/900. Correct?

I’m hoping cut off scores stay the same, but have a feeling since my kid is on the cusp, the cutoffs will go up.

Hi my child got a 97 in reading and 92 in math. We are tier 3 and he really wants to go to northside with his brother and sister. Can he get in?

Mark Robert- based on last year’s scores he would get in but the year before he would not. It really depends on if the trend from last year remains.

Hi thanks. Do you think the cutoff scores will go down or up?

What about Math 99 & Reading 90 , tier 3. Is that good for WY?

Does anyone know if a child has gotten a perfect score. My child goes to a regional gifted center and he says no one he knows got a perfect score. He also said everyone got a low math score. Is this similar to your child?

Sebastian, looks like someone on this forum got a perfect score…
I am wondering what the predictions for this year’s cutoff scores would be for Tier 4, last year were lower but seems like that was an outlier.

One thing that I was not previously aware of was that the CPS “grades” on a curve for this test. My kid got his actual test scores, as well as percentiles. My kid did not score perfect on either. I’m only guessing, a perfect score might be like 350 on either test. He was in the 99th percentile on both. Using the rubric, his “weighted” score should be a 900. I was concerned I misinterpreted the results at first but am more confident today. Looking at cut scores from previous years and the hardest schools to get into, I thought it was suspicious at how many “perfect 900s” there were overall. But the curve made it make more sense.

99th percentile math, 90th reading, all As in 7th, tier 4

I think that gets my child an 880 and hopefully into Lane. Guess we just have to wait 4 or 5 more months.

Last two years, the bottom cut score for Lane Tech tier 4 was 870. Subject to change but 880 is looking good. If Lane is your kids dream school, Don’t forget about principals discretion. Not a bad idea to get recommendation letters ahead of time. Just in case.

To calculate the score into 900, use this:https://drive.google.com/file/d/1_eEs8Xym5IbwVa2_UmifCMM33k95i2SW/view

The percent score is multiplied to get a number of up to 225 for reading/math. Then you add in the grades, and that is your score out of 900. So, a 99th % on Reading and Math + Straight As should get a 900.

And here are the cut scores from last year:https://drive.google.com/file/d/1whgNt2dzFeCJ6PURElRVbQAPs-9pzq2U/view

Hi my son scored 97 on reading as well as 92 on math. Can he make it through northside. We are tier 3.

Hello,

I am curious to hear what were the raw scores for your kids? Mine got 315/332.

My child got a 62 and 72 percentile, she’s usually a over achiever and does great in school but she scored so low. She’s very disciplined with her score because how much she studied, she really wanted to go to lane or whitney and now she is very drained and things tha she’s not capable because of her score, is there even a possibility for her getting in, also she did get straight a’s in 7th grade.

We are also in tier 4 by the way and I know the scores are usually higher,my daughter says she doomed and very dissipointed with her outcome. Also in my first post I mean disappointed not disciplined. Like I was saying how I think this score is really affecting her, she has no appetite and always studying bc she says she just feels so dumb and useless. She has such high expectations for herself that when she got her results she became really disappointed in herself.

Hey everyone,
Tier 3 here. Hoping to get into WY. I am curious about the standard scores, what purpose do they serve?
My child’s score.
Reading Percentile — 97
Reading Standard Score — 315
Math Percentile — 99
Math Standard Score — 322

Reading – 90 (297)
Math – 99 (338)
Tier 4
Gives me an 880, I think I could get into Jones or Lane but is there any chance for WY?

also straight a’s

Why are the standards scores different even if students have the same percentiles?

With 880 in tier 4, any chance for WP or Jones?

Well our neighborhood highschool is not th best and the programs are not exactly interesting for my daughter, update my daughter is still very dissipointed about her scores and I am debating to get her someone so she could talk to because this is really affecting her and ruining her self esteem. I am telling her that von stuben scholars is a good program and when we went to the open house and she liked it but she even bought the lane sweatshirt bc she wanted to manifest her being there.shes still not having an appetite nor wanting to go out of her room.im really concerned for her and based on her scores of a 62 and 72 it is not exactly lane worthy btw she has all as in 7th grade

Hi looks like there aren’t many perfect scores. Seems like the cut off scores will be the same or close to the same. Anyone else agree?

I got 97 (reading) and 98 (math) with straight A’s, and I live in a tier 1 area. I’m hearing a lot about how the scores are going to go up and stuff, and I would think I’m safe, but you never know, so I would like someone else’s opinion on the matter. For context, Whitney is my 1st choice.

8th grade student – I think you’re pretty safely in. Last year an 814 would get you into Whitney from tier 1, and I didn’y computer what your percentiles convert to but probably around 890. Congrats!

I think the cutoff scores will be going down for all the schools seeing many students in the top selective prep schools not getting perfect scores. Seems like the test was quite difficult? Anyone else agree?

Hi for anyone trying to go to Northside Whitney Young, Lane, Payton, etc. As long as you have above a 860 you have a good chance of getting in. I’ve heard of many kids who got 850 in tier 4 who got in to Payton because of principal letters. So please parents of students stop stressing. You will get into the school you desire!

*Disclaimer* I do NOT have any concrete insight.

This is a super stressful process for all who go through it.

One recurring theme seems to be will the cut scores go up this year?

If CPS enrollment has been slowly declining over the last 20 years and the number of available freshman seats has stayed the same. In general, it should be getting slightly easier to test in, OVER TIME, as we should see the minimum cut scores required for the different tiers trend downwards. Looking at ONLY the cut scores over the last few years, my theory seems to hold some weight. Even though there are a some outliers with increases.

Another recurring theme is, how many “perfect 900” scores will I have to compete against?

Using SUPER rough estimates here: If there are 100K total students across all CPS high schools and a quarter of those go on to be CPS freshman, lets just ballpark and say there are a potential of 25K total scores to compete against. There are three different components to the cut score: 7th grade grades, the math test and the reading test. The amount of cut score points students get assigned is based on a seperate curve, for each test. Meaning that regardless of actual test score, the top one percent (the “99th” percentile) will always get the max score of 225 on each respective test. If 25K students took the test, that means that only 250 kids will get the max of 225 on each respective test. In theory, it’s possible for there to be a maximum of 250 total 900 scores, assuming 25K test takers. However, as there are three seperate components that need to come together and we know some kids scored 99 on one test, but not both. We can say for a fact, there are less 900s out there than the maximum possible.

All of that to say, there is no need to fear some huge influx of 900s wrecking test curves and driving up cut scores. Again, if overall enrollment continues to decline, the amount of 900s should also trend down over time.

Looking at cut scores for the last few years, the only school where the amount of 900s has skewed things drastically, is at, is Payton. I believe that their freshman class is about 300 or so. Split 5 ways for top overall score(no tier) and the 4 tiers with seperate cut scores. Looks to be about 60 kids got in with a 900 score, overall. Than basically, all 60 tier 4 spots still needed a score of 900 as well. A few random 900s go elsewhere but it looks like most end up at Payton.

Seeking advice: Living in an area that just moved from Tier 3 to 4. Our top choice is Northside Prep and my child scored a 95/93 and is a below the cut off but has lots going for them! They are IEP/505 Plan. Thoughts? We are going to apply and leverage the Principal’s Discretionary process. This is beyone stressful. Good luck parents!

How does student rank affect things?

Hi my child scores a 97 and 92 which is a 879. We live in tier 3. Our top choice is northside and we have two siblings there. Are they going to be accepted considering the cutoff scores will remain mostly the same seeing mostly the same results from last year?

To MamaBear Guest, unfortunately the odds are stacked against students as this process IS very cut throat.

My daughter too, scored in the same range despite consistently being a straigh A student and scoring high on those tests that supposedly told her she was at an 11th geade level in math, so seeing her percentile in the 70s was quite discouraging for the both of us…

my best advice is to remind your daughter that this test does NOT define her…so many students do use private tutoring and that is quite expensive plus she is also competing against students who come from private schools.

I was told by another parent that works for CPS that MANY students from private schools also apply and get offers so it is not just CPS students..

In any event, if this helps, my friend’s daughter was accepted to YALE! She also received offers from MIT and Duke University..and guess what, she didnt receive not one offer from a SEHS…she ended up at Noble Academy but now 4 yrs later shes going to friggin YALE

her life is NOT doomed bc she was not accepted…and she needs to give herself some grace…that is what I tell my daughter….you are only doomed if you believe this to be true…..

We are in a Tier 3 and my daughter scored 99/90 which is 880. Trying to decide b/w NCP and Lane to rank as first choice in the application. Should we put NCP first and hope she lucks out in Principal Discretion or put Lane first and play safe? Any advice would be appreciated. Thanks!

Any guidance on Hancock School ? How is it ? It seems to be located close to Midway Airport – How do students commute from the loop ?

Really appreciate everyone who’s answering questions here. I believe I’m understanding everything correctly, but just to get a second opinion, our daughter, with a 900 score, would likely get an offer from her first choice, regardless of Tier? In this case, Young.

Hi is an 879 good enough for northside in tier 3.

Hi guys on my high schools admission test I got a score of 732 and I’m tier 2. I want to get into the selective enrollment Jones. I’m far from the cut off score but I’m closer to the score of Jones pre-law. I don’t live in the required boundaries of Jones pre-law would I still be able to get in with a recommendation letter from a principal? Or I aim for the normal Jones with a recommendation letter from a principal?

Camila sweetie I don’t think you can at least it’s not looking very promising.

Hi again I was wondering if I would be able to get into Westinghouse? With a score of 732 and in tier 2. With that should I also ask for a recommendation letter from the principal for that school or Jones?

Does anyone have the document that has all the school’s acceptance scores out of the 900?

This whole process is really stressful, especially for Tier 4 kids. But let’s not let the scores discourage our children—they don’t define who they are. Ultimately, I believe that each of our kids will find the right school where they can truly thrive. Often, bright students who don’t attend a selective enrollment high school end up excelling and even go on to Ivy League colleges, as they can stand out and achieve top grades without as much competition. Let’s stay positive!

Hello,

Considering applying to a CPS SEHS for the 2026-2027 school year. My child is currently in 7th grade, private school, on trimesters.

Which grades will we need to report/submit, all trimester grades or just the last trimester?

At my kids school a 90% is a B, does CPS factor that?

Thank you

Hello Everyone: Thanks so much for all the info you’re sharing. It is tremendously helpful. So, we’ll be moving with my daughter to Chi from South Bend this Summer. This CPS process is entirely new and unfamiliar, and rather bewildering, to be frank. I have a couple of questions: 1) Just out of curiosity, do students usually study or prepare for the HSAT? Is it even possible to? 2) We are Tier 3. My daughter’s percentiles are 97R(315) / 99M(322). That appears to translate to a 445. Her grades amount to 450, for a total of 895. From what I gather from previous comments and links, this puts her in a good position? It appears that (as Tier 3) it might even put her in contention for admission to Payton? Are there any other steps to this process? (for example, submitting recommendation letters? Admission essays? What is the “Principal’s discretion” aspect?). We’ve ordered her schools as Payton, Jones, WY, Northside, Lane (the latter two– NS and Lane– will likely be too far of a commute from where he plan to move to). Jones may be more like a ‘neighborhood school’ and Young a lengthier, but workable, commute. All these schools get such rave reviews, super high rankings, and are described so beautifully. Any thoughts on differences between Jones and Young that are SO significant that we might consider switching the order? Any thoughts or suggestions, however random, are most appreciated!

Is sibling priority a thing for northside and also what does it do? We are tier 3 with my kiddo scoring a 879. Can anyone help if it is a go for Northside?

I got 866 tier 3, do you think I will get into WP? Also what I heard from classmates that the test was glitching(most people who said that took the test on October 20th) Is it true for other cps/non-cps students?

Hi parents! So I just found out that our address switched from tier 3 to tier 2. My kiddo scored a 879 and wants to go to northside. It is very likely he will get in correct. So glad this part of the test is over. Good luck to you kiddos!

Hello! I am a tier 3 who got an 868. Do you think I can get into either lane or Northside?

Hi not to be that person but I am friends with a CPS Monitor of Scores and she told me the cut off scores would be going up significantly. Probably more than 20 points from last year. 8th grade student I am sorry but Northside is not a realistic option but lane can be. CPS Mom your child does have a high chance of getting in. Just trying to clarify things! Good luck to you all! 🙂

“That Person” seems like someone didn’t take that information well. I don’t know why you are saying there is no such thing as a CPS Monitor of Scores when clearly you don’t know much about the CPS Test scores since your on this forum. I in fact also have a friend Kate Pakises who is also a CPS Monitor of Scores. She indeed also said most of the cutoff scores will be
Going significantly up. Think 15-20 points. Yes a lot of students scored perfect and seems your child didn’t because of you denying it. Please be more considerate and knowledgeable on topics you don’t know much about. Thank you!

“That Person” seems like someone didn’t take that information well. I don’t know why you are saying there is no such thing as a CPS Monitor of Scores when clearly you don’t know much about the CPS Test scores since your on this forum. I in fact also have a friend Kate Pakises who is also a CPS Monitor of Scores. She indeed also said most of the cutoff scores will be
Going significantly up. Think 15-20 points. Yes a lot of students scored perfect and seems your child didn’t because of you denying it. Please be more considerate and knowledgeable on topics you don’t know much about. Thank you!

That person. Quite the person you are. Seems like someone is a little mad they don’t get paid well. We all know your lying based on the fact that why is their a CPS teacher on here without an 8th grader. Looks like someone is a little mad their 8th grader is dumb and doesn’t want to share their score. My child in fact got a perfect score without even studying. Got 350 on both tests. Very proud of her! I recommend you stop thinking your all that just cause your some underpaid CPS teacher. Have fun with minimum wage while I make $250,000! People these days!

I think they meant to say 225 because based on the scoring rubric, the maximum score for each subject is 225

Or they don’t know about scoring rubric and just want to argue with someone for no reason

Hello everyone! Happy to see this forum is back to life. Seems like Leah is having a bad day. My child scored 95 94 on the test and we got switched from tier 3 to tier 2 just like someone else on this forum. Can anyone tell me if it’s a good shot for northside. Both siblings are there also!

Does anyone know if cut scores for Choice programs will also go up?

Hi all – I have been going through the past three years of CPS cut off scores and it looks like last years numbers were between 10-30 (in the case of Northside) lower than the previous two years. If the trend is similar to last year, many of the kids scores above will give them a shot at the SEHS schools. Now if they rebound back to the 2023-2024 and 2022-2023 cut off scores, than our kids would need closer to 95 and above for both tests to have a shot at Northside, Jones, Payton, Whitney.

Our daughter has a 98 Math and 90 Reading and 450 (all As for 7th grade GPA), that puts her (according to their rubric they sent us at a total score of 878. The cut off number for Northside last year was 835 (for tier 3), that would mean she has a great shot. But and BIG but, if the numbers bounce back to previous years, the cut offs were closer to 880 and higher.

The wait and see of it all is that, we don’t know if last year was a particularly low data point or this is a trend and these numbers will keep. And even if they do go up, will the overall still remain slightly lower than 2022 and 2023 – at this point we might all be playing the lottery. No way to tell until we see how all kids performed. I can tell you, from previous years (we have an older daughter at Northside) I am hearing a lot less perfect scores, particularly the Reading scores seems to be lower.

2024-2025 cut off scores: https://drive.google.com/file/u/1/d/1whgNt2dzFeCJ6PURElRVbQAPs-9pzq2U/view?usp=drive_link
2023-2024 cut off scores: https://drive.google.com/file/u/1/d/1vUHIhc8qP5w9CRETGaHqCl_9NwEVtf4D/view
2022-2023 cut off scores: https://drive.google.com/file/u/1/d/17-oFoFfDOjegY2YA53K3K4Um9dDf7wsz/view

The other helpful thing I can share, based on our experience at Northside, while our older kid had an 898 and was a round one admit, a good number of her friends were admitted 2nd round and off of the wait list during the summer – and those numbers were a good 30 points lower than the first round admits. I would NOT lose hope until round two admits and even then, summer admits off of the waiting list still happen. The other thing is there are excellent Choice options in schools like Lincoln Park, Von Steuben Scholars, Taft IB, and even Amundsen IB is making strong strides.

Let’s not lose hope, your kids are doing fantastically well, we are doing the best we can. This system is not ideal or always equitable, but I know the majority of these kids will be successful no matter what high school they attend.

Sorry for the long post but I wish when started this process with our older kid, someone spoke reason and sanity to our stress. We have a long road ahead of us for the SEHS process and really it doesn’t end until end of summer (when waitlists and round 1 and 2 offers are done) – until then, don’t lose hope.

We’ve got this!

Hello, sorry for the late reply to this thread. I was wondering if my child, tier 3, who scored a 900, would get into Payton? This is our first time doing this so still unsure about the process.

Hello – we’re in tier 4 and our test score is unfortunately 40-50 points below the cut offs for Whitney & Jones based on the 2024-2025 scores. We’re exploring other HS options but may pursue the principals discretion route for Whitney & Jones which I had questions about. Is principals discretion typically only an option if the student scores are 5-10 points below the cut off or any guidance on how much of a point gap do they consider for principals discretion? thank you

I don’t know if it will make you feel better or not, I have heard that a lot of students Non-Cps students who took test at October 20th experienced a lot of technical issues which worsen their final score significantly . For example at my school, people who took the test 10/20, were above average students and they still got less than 850(most tier 4). Our principal emailed the CPS to retake the test, but they didn’t reply yet. Although it’s experience from my school, it might be similar for other Non-Cps schools.

Did people who took on the 10/26-27 experiences the tech problems too?

Because it might also impact the 2025 SEHS Admission decisions ands cut-off scores.

Hello again! I am the student who sent the message on 12/4. I am a non-cps student and took it on oct. 20, which was the earliest day. I didn’t experience any glitches or technical difficulties. But I will say that a lot of my classmates, who are mostly tier 3 and 4, performed in the 90+ percentile for math and did poorly on the reading. As for myself, I had a 99 percentile and math but a 85 on reading. Which comes out to a 868 with the 450 from grades. Even though my score seems to be not good enough for schools like Payton and Northside, most people from tier 3 that I talked do didn’t do that great either. Sorry for the long post but I thought it was important to clarify some things.

I forgot to mention that I took the test at Lane Tech.

I also took the test with no prior tutoring, which could have affected my score.

Oct. 20 I meant

to say 19

8th grade student. You did quite well for not having any tutoring but I assume the cut off scores would be going up from last year. You might have a chance for Northside with a principal discretion but that’s a hit or miss. Best of luck to you.