The SAT During School Hours

What if the SAT was administered during school hours? How might that change the testing experience?

Just recently, the Sacramento City Unified School District did just that for their juniors.

And it seems there is a movement to make the SAT more part of the academic day. 

Lots of hoops to jump through administratively, politically and operationally but worth a consideration. 

Perhaps offering the SAT at school during school hours would reduce the stress around test day. Might scores go up as a result? 

No matter when they offer the test, CROSSWALK is ready to help. We specialize in test prep for the SAT, ACT, PSAT, SSAT and many academic classes. Contact us today. 

How to Guarantee Admission to a UC

Getting into one of the University of California schools is a competitive process; one that requires strong grades and a good test score. And even if you have good grades and a good test score, admission is not guaranteed. 

Or is it?

Good news because if your dream is to attend a UC, there is a way to guarantee admission. 

As of August 2017, six of the nine UCs (Davis, Irvine, Merced, Riverside, Santa Barbara and Santa Cruz) offer a Transfer Admission Guarantee (TAG) for California community college students who fulfill all transfer requirements. Proper coursework and credits at the community college along with an application submitted on time are the main requirements.

There are some restrictions to TAG, like an exclusion on certain types of degrees at particular colleges. Business Administration at UC Irvine, for example, is a major excluded from this program. Similarly, TAG is not available for students who already have a bachelor's degree or a graduate degree.

Also, you can only request a TAG for one UC and most UC schools only offer TAG for the fall semester. For complete details, check the admission information at the University California website here. 

TAG offers an excellent way to guarantee admission into highly selective and competitive colleges. And students would potentially save thousands of dollars starting first at a community college. Yet another reason to not stress about SAT and ACT scores during high school. 

For test prep tips on the SAT and ACT, contact CROSSWALK. The Monterey Peninsula's primary resource for test prep, CROSSWALK specializes in SAT, ACT, PSAT, SSAT and academic tutoring. 

FREE Test Prep Resources for ACT and SAT

Back in the day, only the ACT provided a FREE downloadable guidebook with a full-length practice test and test prep tips. The SAT did not provide much in the way of free resources.

The tides changed when the College Board redesigned the SAT in 2016. Upon launching a new test format, the College Board also launched a partnership with Khan Academy to create an entirely new and FREE test prep platform with FREE full-length practice tests and tons of study resources.

Now the ACT has pushed to be king of the free resource hill with the recently launched ACT Academy, a FREE online platform full of practice tests, test prep tips and more.

With so many free resources available, this is a glorious time to be prepping for the SAT and ACT.

I am hopeful that free resources will even the playing field. Test scores on standardized tests have historically shown that students who have access to resources will outperform students who don't have resources. Put differently, standardized tests are biased towards those students who had the money to buy guide books, the time to take practice tests or the resources to hire tutors.

Free resources may not completely remove this bias, but they are a good start.

If you need help navigating the resources for the SAT or ACT, contact CROSSWALK today. We offer free resources too, like this this blog, as well as financial assistance or pro bono work for many of our programs.