<p>Okay so I am taking a 6 week SAT course from now until March to get ready for the March SAT which I signed up for and the course guarantees a 200 point improvement (wow like so not original anymore). Anyway I wanted to know if there is any truth to this.</p>
<p>I just don't see how it's feasible. How can they guarantee something so ridiculous? I took a course over the summer that didn't guarantee anything, I went up from a 1580 to an 1820 at one point. I dropped off a little over the path few months because I haven't been forced to study since I'm not in a class anymore. I hover around 1770-1800 now. So anyway when I take this new course, and they are saying I will go up by 200 points, will I get somewhere in the 1900's then?</p>
<p>My daughters friends took the course that guaranteed a 200 point increase. The general consensus was the first test was much harder than the last! Save your money, buy a prep book and keep practicing on you own....that's all it takes. If you're have trouble in certain areas you might be better off getting an individual tutor who can help you on the more difficult questions.</p>
<p>My D has a bit of a visual disability that makes reading difficult and slow. So she scores well on math and writing and lousy on the critical reading because of the dense text. I shelled out over $1400 this past summer and fall to have her tutored for the psat, just for the reading. At her diagnostic test at the beginning of the prep, she scored high on writing and math, and a 48 on reading. After all the prep, she scored 68 on both math and writing with no prep, and 49 on reading! So, her reading went up a whopping one point. For $1400. It was H.L.C. I was very unimpressed. Draw your own conclusions.</p>
<p>tanyanubin-if your D still has time to prep, i suggest her start reading. Usually those test preps don't help a lot until the student start getting 600s. See if she wants to improve from a 49, she'll have to improve English comprehension in general. Learning test taking tips in a short period of time doesn't help that much.</p>
<p>It was Huntington Learning Center. They initially tried to sell us $4500 worth of lessons. There are lots of kids going on a regular basis, several times a week, at $150/hour. They first tested her and she scored a 480. After weeks of prep, they again tested her, and the woman said she didn't have time to score the test (!!) but she told my daughter that she had scored in the 600s. Hmmmm. I've signed my D up for the high school's prep course, for practice on the math as well as the reading. It couldn't hurt, but I'm not holding out much hope for a great improvement, unless the ETS comes through with extended time for her (it's been more than a year's battle with no success). So, overall, I'm unhappy with the hard sell and the level of teaching they offer at HLC.</p>
<p>yea...maybe your D scores better on the ACT? My parents spend a lot of money trying to bring up my SAT score, but it never improved that much. Then i took the ACT without prep and it was much much better.</p>
<p>She actually tried a practice ACT, and scored a 27. The science killed her. But I think that is easily fixed (well, maybe not EASILY) by practice and learning how to take the science part. She did score much much better on the reading on the ACT. She's scheduled to take it soon.</p>
<p>Huntington Learning Center is about the worst SAT test preparation company you can use. One of my current students bought about 20 hours of SAT tutoring from the company and went from about a 1780 on the first diagnostic to about a 1740 on the final diagnostic! So the family spent over $1100 to DECREASE her score by about 40 points! So far, after about 20 hours of tutoring with me, she has improved by 320 points (CR+M+W) from the first diagnostic score (we'll probably go for at least 450 points of improvement). So one can easily tell that the deficiency did not lie with her! I've also heard that Huntington charges roughly $100 for each diagnostic test! (My diagnostic testing comes with the course and is essentially free.) And their tutors, from what I have heard, do not need to have scored very high on their own SATs to serve as tutors. (In one extreme case, a tutor who worked there reported that her co-worker, who worked with SAT verbal, scored about a 380 herself on the SAT verbal section!)</p>
<p>CCers know how much I do not like most other SAT prep companies and tutors (although there ARE some good ones out there) because they charge exorbitant prices for very inferior and sub-par service and improvements (and, in some cases, NO improvement at all!). Huntington is probably the worst offender of them all! DO NOT USE HUNTINGTON LEARNING CENTER FOR SAT PREP!!</p>
<p>Yeah,
Huntington is CRAP. I've heard that as well. So is Kaplan.<br>
I took Princeton Review and that mildly helped me out. It all depends on the teacher and the number of students. I was lucky enough to have an awesome teacher and a class of only two students (including me!!!). The first diagnostic is not nescesarily the hardest, I thought that all four practice tests I took with them were about equal. Their tests are designed to be harder than the reals SATs. That I think helped me out a lot, especially on CR. I went from like a 680 to 720. On Math, I kicked a**. before PR I scored 660. After PR, I had a 740 (with a bit of luck). I believe math is the easiest to improve, especially if you have good prep material and a good teacher. However, if you are motivated enough to sit your butt down for a good two hours and master the concepts, then don't take the class. However, I was very random with prep, doing it whenever I felt like it. So PR helped out with that. Also, I had to get up every Sat. morn to take a 4 hour practice test with PR. That helped build up stamina for the test.</p>
<p>I was not really focused on writing, because I did not have enought time to prep. I just told my teacher to focus on CR and math. A 1460 combined is not bad for 800 bucks. Especially since I got 14000 more in merit scholarship.
And better chances at Wash U and NW. </p>
<p>O and another thing is please try out both the ACT and SAT and see which you are stronger with. I took ACT like so many times and improved 1 point. I'm better with CR so SAT was more suitable for me.</p>