<p>Ok. I've never taken the exam before and first must persuade my school to sign up for it. So a few questions about it...</p>
<p>1: When is it administered?
2: How will finalists be selected for the second round of testing?
3: Exam difficulty? (as compared to SAT II Chem exam difficulty and AMC 12 difficulty)
4: Any organic chem? Any topics not covered in AP CHem/SAT II CHem.</p>
<p>Thanks!</p>
<p>Hm.. I've no experience with USAChO, but I was thinking about convincing my school to do it as well (no time this year though). Here's the official site though; maybe you'll find some of your answers (they have old tests and such on there somewhere): <a href="http://www.chemistry.org/portal/a/c/s/1/acsdisplay.html?DOC=education%5Cstudent%5Colympiad.html%5B/url%5D">http://www.chemistry.org/portal/a/c/s/1/acsdisplay.html?DOC=education\student\olympiad.html</a>. Good luck with your persuasion!</p>
<p>I took the USAChO last year and I can answer some of your questions.</p>
<p>If I recall correctly, I took the first (local) test in Feb though it's different depending on where you are.</p>
<p>The cutoff depends on where you live. I'm in the Chicago area and 11 people qualified last year to take the National test. I think the cutoff was around 53-55 out of 60 questions.</p>
<p>There were like 5-6 organic chem questions in the local test but they were really basic and I got them all right by guessing.</p>
<p>The National Test is a 5 hr long test with multiple choice, free response, and lab portion. This test is VERY hard... much harder than SAT II or AP. Especially the free response section, I got murdered by it. The MC & Lab aren't too bad.</p>
<p>Anyways, good luck :)</p>
<p>Let's resurrect this thread, because I love Chemistry. <em>International Chemistry Olympiad alum here</em> IChO is an awesomez experience <3</p>
<p>@fiona_ : do you have any suggestions for books to read and material to review? My D is very interested but she is not finding enough input.</p>