<p>I am trying to decide which way to go with SAT prep for my son. He is a junior and will take the PSAT this Saturday. </p>
<p>I am wondering whether I should get him a private tutor, go with an online prep or do a SAT prep class. Right now I am leaning toward the online because he has so many ECs (including being on 2 boards and a number of steering committees) that I am thinking it may be easier for him to just follow his own schedule.</p>
<p>Are any of these methods more effective than others?</p>
<p>Thanks</p>
<p>Thanks, MiroKaz. That makes sense to me. My son took the PSAT last year as a junior with no studying or other preparation and got 187 and he said that some of the math (his lowest score) he had never even seen before.</p>
<p>My friend’s daughter who is one year ahead highly recommends a particular company that only has semi-private sessions (2-3 students max per session). She also did a class with one of the better known companies out there and said it was pretty much useless. She got somewhere between 1900-2000 on her first SAT but after her semi-private tutoring got 2260. That may be the way to go.</p>
<p>I did private tutors for my D.</p>
<p>We spent about $1,000 over the summer between Junior and Senior years for three tutors . Her scores went up from the 60% on the June SAT to 91% for the September ACT.</p>
<p>We had math, math/science, and english tutors. I went with two math tutors because it was her weakest area and felt that each tutor would possibly bring something unique to the table, which they did.</p>
<p>She scored well across the boards in all subjects on the test, so it was a great experience. </p>
<p>We hired our tutors off of craigslist, and found experienced pros that way direct. Some worked for tutoring centers and moonlighted on the side. The English tutor was also a HS english teacher at a nearby HS. </p>
<p>We paid between $35 and $65 an hour. There were many private tutoring options that were more expensive which I felt were no better than whom we hired.</p>
<p>It was the best $1,000 ever spent on her education, sort of a competitive advantage.</p>
<p>I know there are kids who take these tests with little or no prep and score high, that
was not our situation. </p>
<p>Only regret was not doing it earlier in her HS career. </p>
<p>She’s now a freshman at a top UC school and loves it.</p>
<p>sandiego4866 - $1,000 is not bad. One of the classes is $1,600 (for 30 hours of instruction). Sounds as if I could do private instruction as cheaply as the classes. I know some of the high school teachers at his school do private tutoring. In particular, last year’s math teacher was excellent and I know she does tutoring. Even if she wants $100 per hour, it would probably be worth it. His PSAT scores for CR was 97% and for Writing Skills as 98% so he probably won’t need that much for English.</p>
<p>I should add that my D was also required to do 3 hours a day of ACT related studying and practice test prep during the ten week summer ‘boot camp’ we set up leading to the test.</p>
<p>Self motivated kids maybe don’t need that type of strict regime, your son with such high scores already probably fits into that camp.</p>
<p>My D was a B+ student at a top public hs who thought it was OK to do as little as possible ‘as long as I get a good grade’. </p>
<p>Her reality shock came early July between Junior and Senior year when she was a recruited athlete at an IVY and got a call from the coach who said her test scores didn’t pass the pre-read at admissions and she should “look at her other opportunities”.</p>
<p>She was heart broken, it was her dream school, she even had a friend on the team. Only then did she finally get motivated.</p>
<p>Only additional suggestion is make sure a tutor has experience tutoring kids for the SAT or ACT. </p>
<p>Good luck!</p>