Black teen achieves perfect SAT score.

[aaaaaa5a]

WE'VE ALL read depressing newspaper stories about underachieving local high school students. This, I'm happy to say, isn't that kind of column.

No, I've set aside this space to give a well-deserved thumbs-up to Cameron Clarke, a senior at Germantown Academy who scored a perfect 2400 on the SAT.

That's right. A perfect score.

That hardly ever happens.

Although more than 1.66 million students took the SAT in 2012, only 360 test takers nationwide achieved a spotless 2400, according to SAT officials.

"I put in a lot of work," 18-year-old Cameron told me when I visited his house in Mount Airy. "I took a prep class with some of my friends, and I did a lot of practice tests from a book.

"But that only prepares you so much," he explained. "The difference between getting, like, a 2400 and a couple of points lower is just focus.


Cameron has been a student at Germantown Academy since preschool, and his parents had an inkling early on that their son was gifted. On an IQ test at age 4, he scored a 151, which is way, way up there.


His mother, Mary Jones, teaches Spanish at Father Judge High School. His dad, Peter Clarke, owns the Reef Restaurant and Lounge at Third and South streets.

http://articles.philly.com/2012-12-18/news/35871335_1_student-government-cross-country-perfect-sat-score



Cameron Clarke is one of just 360 people out of 1.66 million test takers to post a perfect SAT score in 2012

[Gregorian]

1. There's a healthy human. I love it.

This is what we should be spending our military funding on- trying to make all kids like this. Happy.

[aquart]

2. That's nice. Now I want to hear about FULL scholarships.

Possibly including a car.

[exboyfil]

6. As opposed to getting a perfect SAT and being denied admission

Both Bloomberg and the Washington Post noted a high-profile case from 2006 in which Jian Li, a Chinese American student who has perfect scores on the SAT and a number of AP subject tests, filed a complaint against Princeton University alleging the school rejected him because of his race.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/02/02/harvard-princeton-discrimination-complaint_n_1251045.html


While I have been in the admissions field for more than 25 years, I expect to be feeling quite a bit of pain at the end of this week (as I do each year) about the many exceptional youths who did not get offered one of the roughly 1,650 slots in the Class of 2011. I also expect that, in the following weeks, I will hear from parents who are understandably distraught that their sons and daughters with top high school class rankings, perfect 800 SAT scores and some truly impressive extracurricular accomplishments were denied entry.

http://articles.latimes.com/2007/mar/30/opinion/oe-shaw30


Despite perfect scores on the SAT and ACT, a LBJ Liberal Arts Academy student failed to make it into his dream schools.
http://www.thecollegemoneyguys.com/49/#

Frankly I don't think the kid's race has anything to do with it. He has caring, engaged, smart parents (a teacher and a business owner), and he is a hard worker who drives himself like the other kids who score perfectly on the SAT. I don't know about a car, but he will get his pick of full rides. He attends a school who charges almost $30K/yr in tuition for the upper grades. Jokingly - I would like to introduce him to my daughter.

What are public universities are going to in our state is looking at the educational accomplisments of the parents and giving preference in aid to those who would be first generation B.S. holders. It seems to make sense. They also do additional aid for racial diversity. The hurdle for entry is pretty low for our state universities as well.

[1StrongBlackMan]

8. And ...

a fully furnished apartment along with a couple "friendly Boosters" ... Oh wait, that's only for "student" athletes.

Good Job, Cam. I hope to hear great things of you in the future.

[vilify]

3. That's awesome

We need a couple more million kids like him.

[exboyfil]

7. At least ones with the work ethic

Which is to be commended. My daughter won't achieve a perfect score on her ACT, but she works very hard as well (four college courses this semester as a junior as well as five courses and PE at the High School with one of those courses being a dual enrolled course that will give engineering design credit). She will have her freshman year of engineering done as a junior. She took two college classes over the summer between her sophomore and junior years.

She is starting the prep process for her second ACT (she scored a 27 on the first one). Frankly I feel some resentment about the amount of time she will have to spend in ACT prep. I would prefer to have her doing more Journalism news stories, doing more volunteer work, or spending more time with her violin, but you got to get a 30 for consideration for $2,500/yr scholarships. She did what she needed to do on the first ACT - got high enough for admission into both engineering schools in the state without any prep.

[1StrongBlackMan]

9. That's Great ...

Your daughter is doing you proud!

Maybe we should start a "Let's talk about our off-spring" thread ... Lord knows, we hear enough "Ain't that ashame" threads.

[goclark]

4. Fantastic!!!

Can this be in General Discussion too
I think it can be done.
That would be fantastic!!

GoclarkObama

[aaaaaa5a]

10. I just posted it in the GD forum. nt

[aandegoons]

5. Wow that is amazing, only 360 a year.

Congrats!

I had two children make nearly 800 in one subject each. Son had a 790 in Math and Daughter had a 790 on the writing portion. But both of them were closer to 2300 overall than 2400. My son had a SAT score above 2200 at the end of ninth grade, but he refused to do any study work. Daughter was closer to 2000 at the end of ninth but she did study very hard. I can't imagine how smart someone has to be to get 2400.

Oddly enough my Daughter is doing much better than my son did in college....


Hope he makes his dream school of Princeton.

[goclark]

11. I hope he makes your dram come true