February 2, 2024 / Operations Staff / Test Prep
By: Nevada Ryan   Following a pilot round with international students in 2023, in addition to extensive industry chatter, the digital SAT has officially arrived in the United States, marking the permanent transition from the traditional paper…
The Return of Testing
February 2, 2024 / Operations Staff / Test Prep
by: Nevada Ryan   A recent New York Times article, relying on data published last summer by Harvard’s Opportunity Insights research institute, made several claims that should permanently affect the way admissions officers and the public alike view…
September 5, 2023 / Operations Staff / Test Prep
By: Nevada Ryan   It is well known that the SAT is undergoing a major change next year. Beginning in March of 2024, the new SAT– the Digital SAT – will have a completely different format and be administered through a computer-based application. Less…
Early Decision/Early Action/Restrictive Early Action: What They Mean and Strategies for Using Them
September 1, 2023 / Operations Staff / College Counseling, Test Prep
By: Ashley Cole   For each year of your academic life, you may have mixed emotions about returning to school in the fall. You may feel excitement, indifference, or absolute dread. If this is your senior year, it’s possible that you are feeling more…
June 24, 2023 / Operations Staff / Academic Tutoring, College Counseling, Test Prep
by Nevada Ryan The term “test optional” has been around for decades. The first college to institute a test optional admissions policy, Bowdoin College, did so in 1969. It wasn’t until 2020, however, when the coronavirus pandemic forced it from…
March 24, 2022 / Operations Staff / Academic Tutoring, College Counseling, Test Prep
by Chelese Belmont Each year, spring rolls around, and high school students everywhere crack open their cram books, pour over their class notes, and prepare to sit for their AP exams during two weeks in May. The culmination of a year’s worth of…
March 10, 2022 / Operations Staff / Academic Tutoring, Test Prep
by Ali Kinkade If you’re a student trying to make your transcripts look better for college but who is wary of APs, AP History could be a good fit ⁠— and actually may be a better experience than standard history! Why? Here are several reasons:  …
Moving Through the Four Stages of Competence
August 16, 2021 / Operations Staff / Academic Tutoring, Study Skills, Test Prep
by Ali Kinkade Any time you learn a new skill, whether that’s ballet, Spanish, self-care, or the ACT, you move through four stages of competence: Unconscious incompetence Conscious incompetence Conscious competence Unconscious competence Knowing…
exam
April 3, 2020 / Operations Staff / Test Prep
How Optional Is Test-Optional? by Jen Kaifesh There have been a lot of questions since the UC system’s announcement that standardized tests will be optional for students submitting applications in the fall of 2020. Test-optional admissions policies…
December 12, 2019 / Operations Staff / Test Prep
by Annie Manion One of the most frequent questions I get as a test prep tutor is: how many times should a student plan to take either the SAT or the ACT? Neither ACT, the non-profit organization that administers the ACT exam, nor College Board offer…