<p>I would like to hear some CCers' opinions on the standardized testing process.</p>
<p>Do you think that it is legitimate for people get high scores on the SAT by shelling out thousands for preparation or is it a form of cheating?</p>
<p>Does the SAT/ACT have value any more now that so many people are doing so much preparation? </p>
<p>Are the tests themselves unfair?</p>
<p>What are your thoughts?</p>
<p>It has never been shown to me that people who spend thousands of dollars on prep courses do anything other than waste thousands of dollars. All it takes to prep for standardized tests is to do what I and my classmates did in my generation: READ, READ, READ, and READ, using library books that we felt like reading.</p>
<p>Preparing for tests, by whatever means, be it a tutor, review books, reading as suggested by tokenadult, is not "cheating". The student learned the material and was able to convey it on the test. That's no different than using a tutor in, say, AP Bio because you're having trouble with the material. </p>
<p>Some people can afford the "thousands of dollars", some can't. Some people can afford prep schools, some can't. Does that make it "cheating" if you send your kid to Exeter? Some people can afford to move to the suburbs, some can't. Does it make it "cheating" if you do move to a community with good schools? </p>
<p>Whether the tests themselves are unfair is a discussion for people wiser in the ways of testing than I.</p>
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<p>Life is unfair. Within that context, every effort is made to make the tests fair.</p>
<p>I don't subscribe personally to all the opinions I posted; they are opinions I've heard and I wanted to hear what people think of the tests.</p>
<p>I personally am very disgusted by the huge test prep business. People cramming for weeks before they take the SAT for the sixth time . . . it's excessive, and it's lending too much legitimacy to a number that is, after all, only one test, and one number.</p>
<p>I don't believe people are shelling out "thousands of dollars" for a tutor. If they are, they are being ripped off. My parents paid $200 for a nine-week course every weekday after school, and I raised my score more than 200 points. (The course used the Gruber book) My 1100 score was raised to a 1370, a BIG difference that opened up the range of colleges I can apply to. I don't believe it was cheating. I knew all the math skills already, I just learned how to better understand the problems that are used and time management, which are useful life skills anyway.</p>
<p>The College Board reports on how many test-takers do retakes. It's a majority, but not a lot of test-takers take the test more than three times in the last two years of high school. </p>
<p>If people are concerned about being ripped off, the best route is to choose a program with a guarenteed point increase. Then everything is up front (if researched thoroughly). There should be no middle ground: either you get the increased promise or you get your money back. That is how my test centre worked. It's as simple as this: we were told how many points I was guarenteed to go up. We were told the price for that guarentee. We choose to pay the price for the number of points. I got the points, the centre kept the money. And we're happy we did that. Sure, some people think it was way too much money to pay for SAT prep. But my family knows my circumstances, they know my learning style, and they know how much they can and will pay.</p>
<p>What I was referring to was not the test prep programs themselves, but the concept.</p>
<p>Carpe, you even used the phrase "pay the price for the number of points." Is this practice itself legitimate in your opinion?</p>
<p>Fair? No, but it's a legal advantage and people aren't wrong to avail themselves of it.</p>
<p>That being said, almost nothing in life is fair, and standardized testing is more objective than other criteria.</p>
<p>I love SAT prep course. Havn't even taken the SAT yet and I saw that my score improved from 1830 in the diagnostic to 2060 in the third week.</p>
<p>Now I think I can get National Merit Semifinalist because I've taken a Kaplan course. The $900 was very good in motivating me to study standardized tests and it's well worth the money.</p>
<p>In a perfect world, everyone would have exactly the same advantages and disadvantages in the college admissions process. If we tried to achieve this goal by removing advantages from the privileged, however, most of the people on this forum would be considerably worse off than they are right now.</p>
<p>The reality is, the college process in the US is deeply unfair. It is most unfair to the students who cannot afford prep books and who have never heard of CC, students in school districts with average SAT scores in the 300-400s (on a section-by-section basis). It is deeply unfair to students from poor schools with little in the way of college-prep resources: huge counselor-to-student ratios (or no college-counselors at all) and low curricular standards. It is unfair to students from single-family homes, in that it favors students whose parents can afford the time it takes to be directly involved in their children's education. It is unfair to immigrant children, whose vocabulary has been shown to fall behind their peers more and more each year of school.</p>
<p>The disadvantage of students who can afford prep books, but not tutors, pales in comparison. </p>
<p>If we are going to get rid of inequity, then we should also get rid of CC, because it definitely gives a huge advantage to the students who know about it. Or is having a solid network of informed teachers and parents an acceptable advantage, while having wealth is not? Why? You may say, "But that's different; CC is free." But who knows about CC? Primarily, kids with well-informed parents and friends; kids from upper-middle-class environments where an elite education is valued but college prep costs are typically kept to the three or four digits. If we get rid of tutors, I don't think there's a good argument for keeping CC unless we can make sure that there's no information barrier (in other words, that low-income students know how to access it).</p>
<p>If we are going to get rid of wealth as a factor in the college admissions process, then should we get rid of test prep books and materials on the grounds that they are too expensive for many low-income families? If not, why not? How can we possibly say that it is unfair for the upper class to have an advantage over the middle class, but acceptable for the middle class to have an advantage over the lower class? Where do we draw the line?</p>
<p>The real problem, in my opinion, is that there is not enough SAT tutoring available for the disadvantaged students who need it most. These are the kids who most benefit from the help, and who desperately need it to catch up with the truly advantaged students--those from strong school districts and stable two-parent homes, those with well-informed social networks and enough disposable time and income to prepare for the test somehow, even if imperfectly.</p>
<p>I apologize if I've offended anyone; but I do think that it's important to consider the whole picture here. Maybe there are serious inequities in the college process that all of us should be considering. But let's make sure that we're not a bunch of Lexus owners driving around complaining about the pretension of BMWs.</p>
<p>I realize that was a bit of a rant. OP, I know you weren't expressing your own opinions. I guess I was really expressing my frustration about a few earlier threads I've seen on this subject; maybe it was out-of-place here. But in any case, that's my opinion about your question. :)</p>
<p>I know for a fact preping with the right material <strong>DEFINITELY</strong>
improves the SAT scores.</p>
<p>I was stupid enough to believe the crap about prepping does not really improve
and it is all about native intelligence. Believe that at your own peril....</p>
<p>:D</p>
<p>How much of an improvement are we talking about from different methods of preparation?</p>
<p>Legitimate= within the rules, so all prep that is not banned is a legitimate study method.</p>
<p>People can say it's not fair that I had the money to pay (without even know what price that was) for tutoring for a guarenteed point increase, as I phrased it. (The last sentence is not suggesting anyone said something personal about my situation.) Money can pay for the resources to improve. Not having someone take the test for you: someone helping you get ready to do your best. I didn't pay to make my points go up. I paid for someone who had the skills I needed: the ability to teach maths the way I needed to be taught to understand. </p>
<p>As others have suggested, where does calling something unfair stop? Because I had to pay for a M tutor, couldn't I claim that I was in fact the one treated unfairly, because I'm not the daughter of a calculus teacher who could teach me himself? Should someone whose parent teaches SAT-level M or English not be able to seek help from him because that gives him the same advantage as paying for someone who can teach at that level? What about people who live in well-off areas whose libraries have the resources to stock enough prep books to go around when SAT time rolls around? What about people whose parents choose where to live based on how good the school system is? What about people whose parents can't afford the internet, so they can't practice online and don't have the free time at school? What about someone who had a terrible M teacher for two years? What about the person who can't afford a car to drive to work after school and so can't pay for her own prep materials like teenagers with jobs sometimes can?</p>
<p>All calling paying for a tutor (or any other prep) unfair is doing is putting one's personal ideas on where the unfair line should be drawn. I also think it's important to remember that part of the prep decision is made on context. The area I live in is severely rationed for admission into our state schools. In many cases, people in my area are competing for spaces against the people in our area or even in our school, which helps to level the playing field. Every person in my school has access to some kind of SAT prep. The people at school elsewhere might not have that resource, but they are also not directly competing against my classamtes like my school's students are.</p>
<p>in my opinion, you don't really need a tutor or SAT prep class to do well on the SATs. But SAT prep in general does help, whether it's through vocab lists or sat books (college board, princeton review, up your score or otherwise). As for the ACTs, many people don't need to study for this as it is not vocabulary-based (more grammar stuff). </p>
<p>I personally thought the ACTs were a lot more fair than the SATs, but that's just me. And for all of you poor people (me included) that refuse to pay money for sat prep, the library is a great resource for sat books also. If your library doesn't have a book you need, you can even place an interlibrary loan out for it.</p>
<p>For the SATs, studying definitely helps. Your knowledge about certain subjects isn't really going to change much by doing prep. But, becoming familiar with the test itself and it's specific styles of questions definitely could help you. By practicing, you learn how to pace yourself and revisit some issues that could give you trouble. This way, you don't have to worry too much about having not enough time. </p>
<p>If anything, it'll help you feel more confident going into the SATs. I can't say that SAT prep has done wonders for myself (i'll have to wait until the end of
october for that), but i certainly felt a lot better to know that i thought i knew what i was doing.</p>
<p>If you want to spend money at all, the one book I would recommend
is Testmasters BlueBook solutions (~ $16) that explains the rationale
for the answers in the blue book.</p>
<p>I found however that for SAT I, I got the biggest lift from
the free CC resource. SAT essays for example are not
like real essays but need to hit the rubric points. This was
an incredible insight that is actually not available in most prep
books (and yes it works).</p>
<p>Past QAS posted on CC are also tremendously helpful. I personally
love Math, so I have not had to prep for the SAT I (unlike SAT II)
however CR is a different issue. Most public libraries have a number
of copies of the Blue Book and Barrons and between these two you
should be all set for CR. </p>
<p>What I found is that raising scores at the high end to perfection is
nontrivial and requires a roughly 1:5 (score raise: hours invested)
effort. You also want to limit your takes to 3 or less from a
'having a life' perspective ... :)</p>
<p>Oh and if you happen to have mastered AP Eng Lang
prior to a retake of SAT it definitely helps CR, you
know exactly what you are doing rather than using
some of the guessing suggestions the prep
courses seem to offer :)</p>