<p>kchen, whether a PR or Kaplan (or testmasters...whatever) class is useful depends almost entirely on the teacher. Both companies have excellent teachers and horrible teachers. In LA, for example, PR has, at the peak season, around 200 SAT teachers and tutors. Believe me, they aren't all good. (Many teachers get trained in a 2 week course, then end up teaching only a couple of classes before they move on. You don't want one of them:) )</p>
<p>So ask around. Check with people who were really happy with their instructor, and see if you can get into one of their classes.</p>
<p>pete is right...there are a lot of lousy teachers out there...that happened to a friend of mine at kaplan...idk about pr bc in florida it is not too popular...for testmasters i got instructors that were very good and had years working with the company...they have different instructors for critical reading, writing, and math...2 of the 3 i got were perfect scorers...</p>
<p>well, i live in the san francisco area in california, and pr is quite popular here. i have never ever heard of testmasters until people started mentioning about it in this thread. seems to me that they<code>re really good. i don</code>t think they offer it in my area, though.</p>
<p>Yeah, testsmasters doesn't offer any SAT classes in California. I think they used to. I don't know why they don't...it seems like it would be a very lucrative market for them.</p>
<p>PR and Kaplan offer score improvement guarantees, too. The guarantee for all of them is simply that id you attend all the classes and do all the assigned work, then you can take the class again if you don't improve 300 points. I doubt they're losing much money on that...That's not to say Testmasters isn't good.</p>
<p>yeah but the kaplan guaratee is that you will improve...so if you go from a 900 to a 910 then thats enought...and princeton has a 200 point guarantee...</p>
<p>I took Kaplan and so did my sister. My scores took a big jump from my PSATs. I think my PSATs predicted something like 1300. I ultimately ended up with 1510 after my class and two attempts at the test. Some kids in my town say their scores declined after taking a PR class, but that is questionable. That rumor led me to go with Kaplan and it worked out fine. Truthfully, if you have the self-discipline to study on your own you should save your money for college. I just don't have the discipline so it was a good investment for me.</p>