- By Kenny-redacteur
- In ZZBlog
What exactly is Your Advice for pupils Retaking the SAT?

Trung Ngo from LA TUTORS 123 asked me his top 5 questions:
1. All parents want their kids to prosper on the SAT, but few make the time and effort to study and take the test with them—much less take the test 7 times. Beyond keeping your son motivated to ensure success on the SAT, what kept you going from one test to the next?
Well, first of all, I would say that any parent can do what I did (in other words. motivate an adolescent to study for the SAT), and it does not take 7 tests! Any degree of hot engagement from a parent will do (even at first if they don’t act like it. Be patient. They shall!). What kept me going ended up being that I actually like the SAT (crazy as that noises). I enjoyed it … like a crossword puzzle.
2. The school Board reports that 55% of juniors improved their score when they took the SAT again inside their senior year. Just What is your advice for students retaking the SAT? How do they get the maximum benefit out of it?
Oh, wow, let me see if I can be brief here: Be methodical with the planning. The greater amount of vocab, the better. Stay in the row that is front test day, if possible. Just Take the test in a small classroom (not just a cafeteria or gym). Attempt to get a desk that is regulari.e. perhaps not a arm/chair desk tablet).
3. You took the SAT 7 times over the course of 10 months: how did your ratings improve from the test that is first the last?
4. Having tried a variety of test prep methods, which did you will find the most effective? What set it apart from the others?
5. In your blog, you offer plenty of practical SAT tips that are circuitously regarding taking the test, for example, most readily useful SAT snacks or picking the right test location. From your experience, what’s the single many important tip of this kind?
The Hidden Faces of Test Optional
Many prestigious colleges and universities including Bates, Bowdoin, American University, Sarah Lawrence, Smith and Wake Forest now do perhaps not require SATs. The movement has even spawned a sub-category, referred to as ‘test flexible,’ which allows a pupil to decide from a wide array of tests, including the AP, the ACT, or the SAT Subject tests, as alternatives to the SAT.
But it doesn’t mean that high schoolers should forgo the drudgery and anxiety of attempting to do well on SATs or virtually any standardized test unless they should. For while test policies that are optional the impression that colleges wish to diversify their applicant pools, they’ve been perhaps not always as noble as they sound. Moreover, a school can determine itself as ‘test optional’ for admissions purposes, but then require test scores when it comes to awarding scholarships or determining class placement.
Experts argue that ‘test optional’ universities are simply gaming the operational system to gain status in the positions, especially the U.S. News & World Report ratings, which have created a frenzy of colleges vying to move up in prestige. A test-optional policy means more applicants, which means more applicants to reject, which means more ‘selective’ in terms of the rankings go. Test-optional entails that the institution’s SAT average are artificially inflated because applicants shmoop papers writers that do submit ratings have actually greater scores 100-150 points greater, on average than candidates whom don’t.
There’s also the very fact that ‘test optional’ means various things to schools that are different. Students with low SAT scores are hoping for the opportunity to be looked at being a person that is whole than a test rating, but it’s not always that easy. There are policy nuances, such as test optional for students with a certain GPA. Or, test optional state schools, but not if you’re an applicant from away from state or abroad.
On the side that is flip there exists a window of opportunity for some pupils with a high test scores to operate the system to their benefit since the applicant pool at test optional schools is presumably full of score-free applications. High ratings might even mitigate the results a reduced GPA at a test college that is optional.
There is no doubt this one test should not figure out an applicant’s chances, but in 2009, the faculty Board began offering ‘Score Choice’ where students can determine whether or not to send SAT ratings from a certain test time or, should they had a specially bad early morning, omit the ratings for that day (there are exceptions). And yes, there are other restrictions to the SAT’s ability to capture a entire individual, and truly inequalities whereby those that can afford expensive test prep and numerous testings can gain a benefit. However for most students, ‘test-optional’ is more difficult than it might first appear.