Score At The Top Blog

In a January 2013 report titled Improving Students' Learning With Effective Learning Techniques: Promising Directions From Cognitive and Educational Psychology^>1, researchers, after examining 10 learning techniques, presented their findings about which were more effective…

Topics: ACT, SAT Test, Test Scores, Educational-Consulting

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Nearly every agrees: the March 2016 SAT will mark the introduction of a test more difficult than the current SAT (you have four more opportunities to take the current version).

Reading is more challenging with about 20% of questions asking for evidence that supports a student’s answer to the previous question. The so-called “Optional Essay” (hardly optional for the majority of top-tier colleges!) requires textual analysis in double the time of the current test (50 minutes compared with the current 25). And the math. Oh my, the math looks pretty rigorous, to say the least.

Topics: SAT Test, Test Scores, Test-Prep

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Over the past decade, we have heard strange rumblings from the college haunted house on the hill. That’s the building that contains all the schools who have opted out of requiring the sacred admissions test scores (ACT and SAT) as part the application process. Who’s up there? There are over 800 of them ― predominantly smaller schools, institutions outside the mainstream of “brand name” colleges and universities that most people know about. But there are a few on the hill whose names are on people’s lips, and to that group we can now add George Washington University in our nation’s capital. Surely one of the best known universities to join the movement against admissions tests, GW announced that it will no longer require applicants to submit SAT or ACT scores.

Topics: ACT, SAT Test, ACT/SAT, Test-Prep, Educational-Consulting

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The Old Just Might Be Better Than the New!

There are still concerns at this date about how students will perform on the redesigned SAT starting in March 2016. You still have time, however, to take advantage of a decade of test prep experience in preparing for the current version of the SAT ― which all colleges will accept!

Topics: SAT Test, Test-Prep

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Parents often ask us what kind of “return” their students will get for the hours and dollars spent in our test-prep workshops and private tutoring. While every child’s test prep experience is unique, we know that our test-prep work leads students to score at the top of their potential. We’d like to share a concrete example.

Topics: ACT, SAT Test, ACT/SAT, Test-Prep, Tutoring, Investment

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Reading Comprehension Re-Defined: identification and connecting of evidence

As a high school student, you have four more chances to use the current SAT essay format before the big change comes in March of 2016! Four chances to do what, exactly? Write a response to the current SAT prompt that allows for significant personal anecdote - even impressionistic responses that showcase a student’s grasp of written English language. Come March, all that changes.

Topics: SAT Test, Test-Prep

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In September this year, ACT will introduce its new essay format. Six months later, in March of 2016, the College Board will replace its current written essay with a new, optional essay.

Each testing company is migrating toward analysis and away from any possible free-form, even impressionistic renderings by students in their writing ― the College Board more so that ACT. Let’s look briefly at what we know right now.

Topics: Essays, ACT, SAT Test, ACT/SAT, Test-Prep

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A fleeting dream it was, too, that in the redesigned SAT, vocabulary would play a considerably diminished role. We have often noted in our work with students that the average high schooler’s vocabulary leaves room for improvement. So while a student may be inclined to believe that the redesigned test a year from now will be less onerous from the vocab standpoint, in actuality we haven’t observed that. Rather, we note the reappearance of familiar SAT-vocabulary words ― at least in the sample Reading Test just released by the College Board. Their use is conspicuous, though constrained in the sense that these challenging words appear in both the reading passages and questions, rather than in the current “sentence completion” format.

Topics: SAT Test, Test-Prep

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Three Follow-Up Actions

OK. You’ve got the scores. Now what? Here are three important ways to use the information to make yourself college ready:

1. Determine your future testing strategy. Are you satisfied with the results because you know that your scores put you at least in the 50th percentile of students accepted in the current freshman class? If not, back plan today from the next feasible testing date – and renew your test preparation (see #2).

Topics: SAT Test, Test Scores, Test-Prep, College Application

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It’s December – the time when every student across the U.S. who took the PSAT/NMSQT gets back a copy of the PSAT itself, and, most importantly, a score report that breaks down the results on all three test sections: writing, reading, and math, including the student’s responses and the correct responses to every question.

So what’s a motivated student to do with all that feedback? Here are our five suggestions...

Topics: SAT Test, Test-Prep, Educational-Consulting, PSAT

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