The current perfect score on the SAT is 2400.
It used to be 1600, when the SAT had only two parts: Math and "Verbal". Now the "Verbal" has been updated to have two parts: "Reading" and "Writing". The Reading is a multiple choice, like the old verbal. The writing requires writing (which, inevitably includes subjective judging which seems to go against the whole idea of a standardized test)
My son had a 1580/1600 on his SATs, was third in his high school class of 600+, and didn’t get into the 3 Ivys where he applied.
The competition for Ivy's is very tough now. Acceptance rates at the top ones are around 5%. The vast majority of those applying have great board scores and grades. I've seen kids with 8 AP exams, all 4s and 5s, not get in to schools.
Yet, another young man in the class, well below my son on SAT and class rank, got into every Ivy he tried. One of these students is not like the other one...........
Schools are caught between a rock and a hard place. If they admitted on a pure true meritocracy, based only on board scores, for instance, they would end up with lots of Asian and Jewish kids and lots of lawsuits from the others. We would have demands that the test be changed (and I wonder if the addition of the writing part of the SAT was partially to make this happen in some hidden way), and accusations that the tests are racist, etc. You already know.
Now they try to take race into some account, but not overwhelming. The Ivy's don't want to lower their standards, but they want to have a good percent of black students. Thus, if you are a black who is qualified on the merits to go to the school you are extremely valuable to them - they can meet both their diversity goals and keep their academic standards, if they get you to attend. That's why 12 out of 12 Ivy's took this kid, I would guess.
If you are that good as a non-minority applicant you go from a 1 in 20 chance of getting in to 1 in 3 or 1 in 5 or something, so you probably aren't going to run the table on getting admitted at that level.
As you move down the ladder of perceived academic excellence (notice the work "perceived" - it may well be that some private religious colleges, or even large state schools are highly excellent in some areas, and exceed most or all of the Ivy's, but they don't show up on "top colleges" list very often) there are not enough qualified minorities, so that's where you get the more crude affirmative action like lower scores required for blacks. Places like Harvard and Yale really don't want to do that, so they look for brilliant Nigerians with near perfect board scores. Still, they are being sued by Asians and Jewish kids, who claim that they are discriminated against by the Ivy's taking less qualified blacks (and whites, possibly, I haven't seen the law suit, only read about it).
It's a mine-field that has been designed for them. I don't envy them the job of sorting it all out.
I also believe that board scores and grades are legitimately not the only thing that private colleges look at, or should look at Extra-curricular activity, sports, music, work, are all important factors in admitting someone. Any college that only admitted on board scores I think would end up a pretty boring place, with only one type of student (the droid).
The Mandarin system of ancient China worked to move the smartest, as defined by standardized tests, into government service. The result was a stagnant and stultifying bureaucratic society. As an extreme example.
The Mandarin system in ancient China was a meritocracy, recruiting the brightest for the civil service, but look what happened. 100% of those selected were Asian. Where was the diversity?