<p>I have heard many people reccomend using a pen to write the essay. I would love to use a pen but I am afraid that I would get completely screwed because of it. Has anyone actually used a pen and get a good grade on the essay??</p>
<p>The collegeboard states that they will not grade your essay if it is in ink. But I don't know whether they would follow through with this statement or not. I used a mechanical pencil on the essay :D. It helped my essay to stay neat.</p>
<p>yea..if u use pen.. u will be charged extra for them to grade ur essay if it is in pen</p>
<p>it's the same as a scantron, so the pen won't scan properly.</p>
<p>For the essay, dont use a mechanical pencil. Your essay is scanned and mechanical pencil lead doenst scan very well, and the grader will have a hard time reading it</p>
<p>umm how will the pen not scan properly? The essay doesnt run through the scantron; it is read by two readers- and im pretty sure they can read stuff written in pen.</p>
<p>Graders read essays from their homes. Basically, use a pen if you're willing to pay extra fees and possibly not get your essay scored.</p>
<p>College Board scans the essays so that whatever ink is on the answer sheet is removed. Thus, when the readers read the essay, no lines are present. If you use pen, the ink will not show up and you will basically have a blank page. For verification, check your score report and look at your scanned essay. There are no marks with ink on it.</p>
<p>I used a mechanical pencil for my oct test--it worked out purrrfect!</p>
<p>stupid proctors....all i brought was a mechanical pencil but the proctor said we can't use it so i ended up using the number 2 pencil.....eh...could have done much better had i used a mechanical pencil</p>
<p>lol its a psychological thing</p>