SAT: The Ticket to a Great College

When it comes to college admissions, the SAT (or the ACT) is the one factor that can trump everything else. If you have lousy grades, low involvement and a lackluster application essay – but you have a 2300 on your SAT, colleges will still take interest in you.

All colleges claim they “look at students holistically.” Sure, they will look past your SAT, and in some cases they will favor students with lower SAT scores and high involvement/grades over those with higher SATs and lower grades. But, still a 2300 gets you in the door almost anywhere.

That’s just another way of saying that your SAT can make or break your college application. 

Why? Because it makes admissions counselors’ jobs a whole lot easier. You can compare all students across the board on SAT scores, but a 3.8 at one school is not the same as a 3.8 at another, especially as some high schools are notorious for grade inflation. We’re looking at you, schools who give students 5.0 GPAs instead of 4.0. 

What’s a good SAT score: Most colleges set minimum SAT requirements, and if you want to be accepted into the top schools, you’ll need to score in the top 90^th percentile.  Your ranges will have to be 620-760 (reading), 630-780 (math) and 620-760 (writing) or a combined 1870-2300, according to about.com.

The average SAT score is around a 500 for each section or a 1500 total – specifically 497 (reading), 514 (math) and 489 (writing). The Writing Section, being the newest section, is still considered by most schools; however, the Math and Critical Reading Sections are weighted a lot more heavily. Writing was added in 2005, and some colleges that focus on engineering or other math-related fields won’t even factor it in.

How many times should I take the SAT: As many times as you can tolerate. It can get expensive, but the benefits of taking the test multiple times can far outweigh the $49 administration fee. First of all, you might not be as anxious the second time you take the test, and you might be a little familiar with the types of questions and structures. You’ll have an idea of what worked and what didn’t. 

Also, a lot of colleges will combine your SAT section scores. So, if you take it one time and score a 650 (math), 750 (reading) and 730 (writing); then you take it again and score 760 (math), 620 (reading) and 700 (writing), some colleges will only consider the 760, 750 and 730. So, why wouldn’t you take the test as many times as you can?

SAT Tips: How to improve SAT score: Practice is the best way to improve your SAT score, but you have to practice the right way. Randomly taking practice tests won’t help much. Instead, you need to sit down and create a legitimate strategy or action plan for your SAT.

 First, take a full practice test to get your brain used to thinking for over 3.5 hours straight – just to find out where you struggle. Then, it’s best to work through your problematic areas with a tutor, as he/she will help you break these complex questions down into simple patterns and structures. And if tutoring prices are a concern, don’t let it worry you. You can always find great tutors that will work with your price range. At this point, focus only on your problematic areas until you improve.
Then, take another full practice test, and repeat the process of focusing on your most difficult questions until you feel confident with these problems. After this, take one more practice test so you can connect everything you learned with everything you already knew. When you take your practice tests, try to mimic the actual test’s scenarios. Take them in a public, but quiet place (like a library or coffee shop) and sit down for the entire 3 hours and 45 minutes. Take the tests in the order they appear on the SAT and only take breaks as the test offers them.

Middle scores for top colleges, according to about.com.

 

	SAT Scores
	Reading		Math		Writing
	25%	75%	25%	75%	25%	75%
Carnegie Mellon	620	720	670	780	620	710
Duke	660	750	680	790	680	780
Emory	640	730	660	740	640	730
Georgetown	620	730	630	730	-	-
Johns Hopkins	630	730	650	760	630	730
Northwestern	670	750	680	770	660	750
Notre Dame	650	740	670	760	640	730
Rice	650	750	670	780	640	750
Stanford	650	760	680	780	670	760
University of Chicago	660	770	650	760	-	-
Vanderbilt	650	740	680	760	650	730
Washington University	680	760	700	780	-	-

This guest post article was written and provided by Marissa Krause who is a stay at home mother and homeschools her children with the help of VarsityTutors.com.

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SAT and ACT Secret Guides

Do you want to know the Secrets to score well on the SAT or ACT?

There is no question that the SAT/ ACT is the most important test that a student will take during his or her career in high school. Both of these tests are important in college applications and decisions as they are both administered on a national basis. If you are deciding whether or not to use test prep, then make sure to read this article. Everyone knows the basics of each of these two tests and how they differ. For anyone who does not, the SAT tests how well a student can reason and take a test, while the ACT tests what a student learns in school. There are other secret SAT and ACT facts that are important to know.

SAT

The SAT now takes about 4 hours with a 5 minute break every hour or so. I am not going to lie, but it is pretty bad. It takes a lot of stamina in order to take this test and do well. It really does not help that the SAT starts at 8 in the morning, so students had better be fully awake at the start. The SAT is based on a 2400 point scale 800 points for reading, 800 for math, and 800 for writing. The nationwide average scores for each of these sections is around 500. A score of 600 per section is considered pretty good. 700 is very good and anything higher is amazing.

This test is not easy. In fact it is hard; no SAT secrets can change that. It has the illusion of being easy, but in reality, it is far from easy.

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The questions themselves are not too difficult, but they are tricky. Especially the math. The math problems really only require some basic algebra II, but they are very easy to mess up. The test makers purposely try to make the test confusing to stump high school students. If one can figure out what the question wants, then it is definitely possible to score above a 600. Scoring higher than a 600 requires some real knowledge of math. Fortunately, even the hardest problems are not impossible, and there is always a shortcut to the answer. As a general rule of thumb, if a student is sitting crunching numbers for over a minute, then something is wrong. It is possible to solve almost all of the math problems in under a minute.

The reading is also not that hard. First off, there are about 15 vocab problems, 6 of which are tough. (the other 9 are words that everyone should know). The rest of the critical reading is reading passages and answering questions about them. There are long, medium and short passages and their names describe the only differences between them. I personally think that the long passages are the easiest, but that is just me. The great thing about the reading is that it is graded on an insane curve. A student can get something like 10-15 out of 60 or so questions wrong and still have a mid 600 score. It gives hope for the future. The secret to SAT reading is to practice reading before test day and be able to identify shifts in the passages.

Lastly there is the writing section.  I find this section to be the easiest on the entire test. The national average for the writing portion of the SAT is the lowest, below 500. The writing section only tests on grammar and proper English usage in the multiple choice. If you can write well, then this section should not be too difficult. There is also an essay at the very beginning. The SAT gives 25 minutes to write this essay on a pretty broad topic. Some people describe the topic as a "Miss America question" because a student can basically write about anything. The secret to SAT writing and a good essay is to take a solid stance on the issue and have a few solid examples to defend the thesis.

ACT

The ACT is the other standardized test that colleges will accept. Most colleges require either the SAT or the ACT but they claim that neither is superior to the other. So what is the difference between the SAT and the ACT?  --Well for starters, the ACT is a shorter test. It is only about 3 hours 20 mins of testing, which is a bit shorter than the SAT. The downside is that each of the sections on the ACT is longer than on the SAT. There is also an additional science section on the ACT and it is based on a 36 point scale. Unfortunately, unlike the SAT there is not much of a curve on the ACT. Think of the ACT as 5 individual subject tests, while the SAT is one big test. The overall secret to the ACT is to manage time well.

The math section is very long. It is 60 minutes in one run to answer 60 math problems. It is not fun to do. The questions themselves are not difficult, in fact out of the 60 questions, there were only a handful that I was not sure how to answer on my ACT. Compared to the SAT, the math was very straightforward, even easy. The biggest challenge in the ACT math is the short amount of time that is given to answer the questions. The other challenge is that the test takes a long time to complete, so a student needs the stamina to muscle through it. Especially for this test, the secret is to work swiftly and not get stuck on one problem for too long.

The English section is very easy in my opinion. I think that it is easier than the writing section on the SAT because it does not present more than one concept at a time. There is a passage with something underlined every line or so and the student needs to fix the mistake with the best answer choice. Even more than the SAT, the ACT English is common sense, and there really should not be much of a problem with it. Just make sure to know and understand proper grammar. A question is usually wrong simply if it "sounds" wrong. It is that easy. No real secrets here.

The reading section is well, reading. It is very similar to the SAT reading, but without vocab. In fact, the ACT does not have a section dedicated to vocab at all. One needs to read the passage and then answer questions about it. It is the same concept as the SAT, but most of the passages are considered "long passages" and have about 10 questions each. Some of the passages in the SAT are only a few lines long with 2 questions, but that does not happen on the ACT. Be ready to read passages that count over 100 lines (around 750ish words) each. The secret is to be able to use common sense to answer questions and not fall for the trick answers. Try to think of the answer before looking at the answer choices.

The science section is something else entirely. This section is not tested on the SAT, but it is pretty similar to the reading section. The entire science section only requires students to interpret graphs, charts, and conclusions. No previous scientific knowledge is needed, so it is much like another reading section with scientific jargon. The hard part about the science section is that there is only 35 minutes to read 7 passages AND answer 40 questions. You really need to work fast to get this done in time. The secret here is to be able to work swiftly and efficiently. It might not even be worth reading all the passages in order to maximize time for the graphs and questions. No joke, you need to work fast.

The writing section on the ACT is just an essay. The format is pretty much the same as on the SAT, but the readers want more specifics than the SAT. The other big difference is that on the ACT students get 30 minutes to write their essay as opposed to the SAT which only gives 25 minutes. The topics that the ACT essay covers are usually about school, or something affecting teenagers today. The questions are much more specific than on the SAT, but still broad enough to write about almost anything. I find this essay to be more difficult than the one on the SAT because a student actually needs to think about his essay before writing it, and examples are more difficult to think of. Regardless, the ACT essay is definitely manageable if a student can write pretty well. The secret? Pick a stance and start writing. Do not spend over 2 minutes deciding which way to go, just pick. It's not like the ACT is going to hold you to your viewpoint, they just want to know if you can write well.

In all honesty, the hardest part about taking either the SAT or ACT is the stress and nervousness associated with it, especially the morning of the test. It prevents students from thinking properly or on the case of the SAT, figuring out exactly what the question wants. Neither test asks particularly difficult questions, but the surrounding circumstances make them seem hard. With these secrets for both the SAT and ACT and regular knowledge, students can score very well.

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