READ READ READ, So You Can Write!
by Dr Aimee Weinstein
With the advent of College Board’s new redesigned SAT next month, schools, students and test prep centers are on high alert, wondering what to expect. Even the New York Times and U.S. News and World Report have added fuel to the proverbial fire with their recent articles about concern over increased reading requirements on the redesigned test. It seems that there will be more reading not only in the designated reading section, but also more word problems in the math section, leading to more words on the test overall.
But the biggest change is perhaps in the way the College Board will administer the new, optional essay component of the test. (more…)
Maybe to call it “bait and switch” is extreme, but we are pretty annoyed. Last fall College Board introduced the redesigned PSAT and SAT, and released the scores in January 2016. At the time, it seemed as if all of the juniors we talked to were doing better on the new test, but we work with small numbers of students and figured that the new (and radically different) test was just better-suited to these individuals. This was also the perception of counselors we spoke to at various schools. Many of these same students also took an ACT in the fall with Inspiring Test Prep and in some cases, based on a comparison of 2015 PSAT scores and percentiles to the ACT diagnostic, we recommended they take the SAT, instead of the ACT.