<p>So we have the ACT practice test results which they emailed us tonight but we haven’t had a chance to go over them with the prep company yet. English 35, Reading 36, Math 31 and Science 28 (which was a big surprise because on the PLAN she had a 28 out of 32 in Science)
Just adding up the total and dividing by 4= 32.5. Does that get rounded up or down?</p>
<p>I see on the conversion chart that a 32 on the ACT = 2160-2210 on the SAT, which does look better than her SAT 2080.</p>
<p>Also it’s really easy to tell from the Math results where it is that she needs to review: the most complex questions at the end of the section. She made 8 errors and 7 of them are in the last 12 questions. Science is a little more complicated but she’s going to talk to the test prep center manager this afternoon. They told me her composite is a 33 :)</p>
<p>On the other hand I’m looking at conversion charts and seeing different numbers which don’t look quite as positive to me. The one with the numbers I posted a while ago isn’t the official ACT chart, but another that came up when googling: <a href=“SAT to ACT Conversion Chart: Convert Your SAT Scores to ACT Scores”>http://www.studypoint.com/ed/sat-to-act-conversion/</a>. On the official ACT chart a 32 is 2080-2130 and 33 is 2140-2210 which is still better than 2080 but not quite as good as I thought. <a href=“http://www.act.org/aap/concordance/estimate.html”>http://www.act.org/aap/concordance/estimate.html</a></p>
<p>Still, she has a month to review. She feels good about her results and thinks she can pull up the math a bit and the science quite a bit.</p>
<p>To update: D took the April ACT and got a 33. Then she took the May SAT and was thrilled to find out today that she got a 2260! That was a 180 point gain.
Surprisingly 170 of those points were just in CR and Writing, but in a way I’m not surprised because in many of her practice tests she consistently scored in the high 700s. In Math, where she did a lot of review work, she gained just 10 points.
So from 213 PSAT to 2080 in January (CR 740 M 660 W 680) to 2260 in May (CR 800 M 670 W 790)</p>
<p>Good job!</p>
<p>I’m glad her work paid off. Congrats :)</p>
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<p>Fwiw, your daughter appears to be a perfect candidate for … spending time during the summer on an adequate SAT workout. Lopsided scores with a lower Math than CR/W are the easiest (by far) to ameliorate, and especially if a student misses most of the last questions on the Math. The reasons (running out of time or simply find the problems harder and more confusing) are EASY to address through dedicated practices. </p>
<p>My recommendation is to grab a nice stack of REAL tests (not the junk issued by Kaplan, PR, et al) and look for the various books that contain explanations. Several cover the Blue Book. There are wonderful videos available that are amazing for the Math sections. I particulary like the versions proposed by Satquantum – just google it! </p>
<p>Also, regardless of the time issue, do NOT have your daughter WASTE her time on full test or think she needs to work under timed conditions from the get go. The advice to take full tests is easily one of the worst given to students. The motto should be to pursue the biggest gains in the shortest amount of time! Work on the specific issues uncovered by taking the real tests issued by the College Board. For the time issue, after all issues of lacking knowledge are addressed, start shaving time section by section. </p>
<p>The best approach is to take one section a day and spend about 30 minutes on a section and an additional 20 minutes to review ALL answers, including the correct ones to fully understand how the problem works and was presented. Long term repetition works really well for the SAT!</p>
<p>PS Brown loves very high SAT scores! </p>