Get SAT

The Scholastic Aptitude Test. 

At the school where I teach, the last kid I know of to “pitch a perfecto”…to put up a perfect score on the SAT…was a girl I had taught when she was a sophomore in my Honors Algebra 2 / Trig class. 

When I heard about her score, and subsequently ran into her in the hall, I asked her to swing by my room at lunch sometime because I wanted to pick her brain about her SAT journey. 

That same day, she came by my room and we took a walk around campus and talked about the SAT.  It took me one question, and then her answer to re-open my eyes about how to be successful.  As I remember it, our conversation was as follows:

Me:      Congrats again on your score.  Way to go.  So what’s the “secret sauce?”  What’s the pathway that led to the magic? 

Her:     Well, my mom enrolled me in the Kaplan SAT prep classes that met on Saturdays.  It didn’t really work for me.  I kind of felt like they were trying to teach me how to “beat” the test not prepare for the test.  They had some good practice tests though and I found those really helpful.   I went to Barnes and Noble and bought the big blue College Board SAT Book with 8 practice tests and a bunch of smaller practices sections within as well.  I did every problem in the book till I got them all right.  Then I bought the another SAT Review book and did every problem in that book.  Every night after my regular homework I spent an hour doing problems.  When the test came along there was nothing I hadn’t seen.

Me:      Cool  ( I know right?  Impressive command of the language)

For me, there are so many important take-aways.

Students.  There is no substitute for hard work.  There really isn’t a way to do less and succeed at the highest level.  Many of you haven’t learned that lesson because you found a way to succeed, even in Honors and AP classes, by doing relatively little.  Remember all those books you were supposed to read and annotate?  Yet you chose to grab the Sparks Notes instead and then only skim that!  Maybe the above SAT journey teaches us all that it is great effort that leads to great reward.