<p>I have a perfect 4.0 in a million APs, every extra curricular activity, leadership roles, and go to a tough school! I couldnt POSSIBLY be working harder! I gave up my vacation while the rest of my family went to stay home during my winter break and STUDY for these stupid SATs. I am horrible with standardized tests because i have a heart condition where i get nervous and apprehensive very easily and i make all of those common mistakes that the test board tries to get you to make! I desperately want to get into UPenn and these SATs are just frustrating the hell out of me. Especially because ive been told that ill need to take courses and get a tutor to help me. Tutors cost $100 per hour. Thats not realistic! They take advantage! Im not paying a few thousand dollars for a tutor to teach me how to take a test which requires you to throw everything you learned in school away. I can ace an AP bio test no problemmmm because its content based and theres no tricks or scams. How is this supposed to measure intelligence? im being told to look at community colleges with the scores im getting on the SAT, the same colleges that people who dont care about school are looking at and are in remedial classes and dont do half the work i am. </p>
<p>Take the ACT with writing-- it replaces the sat and is curriculum focused. Do a practice test and see if you fare better-- my d wishes she had done this in the first place!</p>
<p>are you sure-- my understanding is that schools consider them interchangeable. Call the admissions office of the school you are interested in and ask directly! Dont give your name and you will know for sure!</p>
<p>Not true, according to the presenter in our info session at Penn SAT=ACT in their considerations. In your case, since the fewer tests the better, the ACT would be the better choice.</p>
<p>According to their website:
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<p>Also: Since your test taking issue cardiac in nature (I’m reading this as a legit diagnosis, not conjecture on your part), can you be treated medically for the issue?</p>
<p>Sounds like the ACT is the better choice for you. I wouldn’t worry about SAT/ACT bias, colleges are more worried about being politically correct than they are about having a score from specifically the SAT or ACT. Plus, at this point any SAT/ACT bias is negligible if your SAT score is so low that people are telling you to look at CCs (I don’t know how serious you’re being…).</p>
<p>if your bad at taking tests no biggie there are lost of really good schools that don’t require test scores forexample Wake Forest is a really good school and they don’t need test scores if you have the grades you say you do this school might be for you</p>
<p>Ur a typical overacheiver not smart just works very hard. No offense but u are one of many that is the point of the sat to separate the few from the bunch. What is ur score anyway?</p>
<p>The SAT is a reasoning test, not an intelligence test. </p>
<p>If you can’t get a high SAT score, then you have a relatively small chance of going to a college that wants students with high SAT scores.</p>
<p>You don’t need to study for the SAT. You don’t need to memorize anything. It is pure reasoning. Give me a question that does not require a large amount of reasoning. People can tutor you here for free.</p>
<p>^ Those scores are going to get you a LOT farther than community college; trust me. I’d highly recommend you to get the Official SAT Study Guide (the Blue Book) published by the College Board and do a bunch of practice tests. The Kaplan Critical Reading workbook was particularly helpful for me too (I went from a 63 CR sophomore year PSAT to a 690 CR sophomore year SAT to a 72 CR junior year PSAT), and I’d also highly recommend you to get the Gruber’s book if you’re struggling with Math.</p>
<p>No i understand the math, i know my grammar rules, and i can understand what i read. My problem is that i make all of the dumb mistakes they try to get you to make. like i was reading the SAT review book and it said “for hard questions NEVER do algebra. if you use algebra youll most likely get it wrong. plug in answers” like algebra and geometry come easy to me and i do really well in them but the SAT in senseless…i dont think it matters if you understand the subject. its how you take the test.</p>
<p>I have never recognized much truth in the common claim that the SAT is full of tricks. One just has to be able to concentrate and read what the question is asking for.</p>
<p>I haven’t either. As a matter of fact, I only just moved here from Singapore this past summer, and in regards to test preparation there were a whole lot of lies circulating around there, most of them claiming that the SAT involved tricks that only certain tutors could teach, and as a result I saw plenty of desperate parents spending thousands of dollars on test prep for their kids. Too bad people over there just aren’t so familiar with U.S. college entrance exams. They know a lot about the O-Levels and A-Levels (the Singaporean education system uses the British system), but not so much about the SATs.</p>
<p>For the most part, I’m a fan of the SAT: it strikes a pragmatic balance between testing achievement and reasoning. I rarely hear any helpful suggestions for improving the SAT; most people just criticize without providing alternative approaches.</p>
<p>Moreover, the criticisms that because preparation increases one’s score, wealthy people are at a significant and intrinsic advantage are products of exaggeration. The best preparation is the Blue Book, which can be purchased by most. Relevant vocabulary lists, additionally, are freely available on the Internet.</p>