The Big Deal about the SAT

Ahh the ominous SATs. Did you know that my middle school and high school made us take our SATs every year? Evidently that’s not a thing with other schools though. Some people.

 

Regardless if your school makes you take them every year or only once, the SATs, like the ACT, can be quite the vague idea. (For our blog on the ACT, click HERE) Similar to the ACT, though, there are ways you can go about being more prepared for the SAT.

 

First of all, what is the SAT. The SAT, or the “Standardized Achievement Test, is another way that Universities and Colleges can assess your education level and college readiness. This test is typically taken by high school juniors and seniors (unless you go to a school like my old school).

 

Second, what does the SAT entail? The SAT consists of four major parts with an optional fifth: reading, writing and language, math (without calculator) and math (with calculator) with an essay portion being the optional fifth. It is scored from a 400-1600 with the 2017 average right around 1083 according to ScholarPrep.com.

 

Third, how do the scores compare to the ACT scores. On our ACT post, we shared the average acceptance rate based on level of selectivity in universities. This is what the equivalent would be in SAT scores:

  • Highly selective (27–36) (majority of accepted freshmen in top 10% of high school graduating class): scores – SAT 1280-1600
  • Selective(25–27) (majority of accepted freshmen in top 25% of high school graduating class): scores – SAT 1200-1280
  • Traditional(22–24) (majority of accepted freshmen in top 50% of high school graduating class): scores – SAT 1100-1280
  • Liberal(18–21) (some freshmen from lower half of high school graduating class): scores – SAT 940-1100
  • Open(17–20) (all high school graduates accepted, to limit of capacity): scores – SAT 900-940

 

 

What should all of this mean to you?

 

Scholarships – not unlike the ACT, comparable SAT scores will grant you academic merit scholarships to most universities. That means you shouldn’t stay up to 2 am the night before the test (like a certain post writer might have done) playing video games. Take it seriously and you might find yourself in a good financial place freshman year!

 

Practice – Most SAT help websites will say the best thing you can do for the test is to pay attention in class, do your homework, and stay on top of your schoolwork. That being said, taking the test multiple times could help as well, which is why I am actually happy that my school forced us to take the test so many times. There are also multiple study helps online just like the ACT.

 

If you read the ACT blog post, you should’ve seen a lot of the same content in this article. While the ACT and SAT test different things and have different scoring outcomes, your approach to them can be similar.

 

Big Takeaway – Do your work in school now and take the test seriously.