Hey everyone, this is Brooke with SuperTutorTV and today we're going to talk about whether
you should take the new SAT or the ACT.
This is a question I've been getting a lot.
The first thing that I want to do is make a quick disclaimer: if you are a senior graduating
in 2016, this video is not for you.
You should be watching another video, which is the old SAT vs. the ACT, we can put that
link up right here.
But for everybody else, for everyone who's graduating in 2017 and beyond, you, as students,
are going to be subjected to an experiment by the College Board, which is a new test,
which has new emphases, which has new styles of questions, and a lot of people in the test
prep community have basically responded to this change in the test by saying, "everybody
should just prep for the ACT, forget about the SAT!"
Now, while that might be okay advice for some students, I don't think it's the right answer
for 100% of people.
So what I'm going to do is get into this conversation and talk to you about some situations in which
it may actually be better for you to take the ACT than the SAT, as well as some situations
in which it might be better for you to take the SAT instead of the ACT.
The number one reason that you should take the ACT instead of the SAT is if you are going
to be an insane prepper.
If you are going to put your pedal to the metal, you are going to spend an inordinate
amount of time prepping for this test, and you want to take every example test humanly
possible that you can, you want to look at as many prep books as you can, you want to
learn all the secrets of the test, and you're going to just go for it.
There are so many ACTs, old ACTs, that are available for download so if you're looking
to really get a ton of real tests in front of your face, and really get to know the test
well, you're going to have a few more materials to work with.
The other reason why you might want to take the ACT is if you're going to take a prep
class.
If you're going to a place like the Princeton Review or Kaplan or - I don't know what companies
your town has.
There's probably some smaller tutoring companies.
I generally recommend smaller tutoring companies over the big ones.
Sometimes those teachers are going to have a lot more experience tutoring the ACT, and
so they might be better at tutoring the ACT than tutoring the SAT.
And finally, the third reason that you might want to take the ACT and not the SAT is that
you're bad at writing or reading comprehension.
If those are the two areas that you struggle with the most, generally the ACT version of
those two sections is a little bit easier to conquer than the SAT, though really it
does come down to: in what way do you struggle with that?
So that's about it.
Okay, three reasons to take the ACT: One is if you're going to be a super prep superstar.
Two is if you're taking a class, and three is if you're not so good at reading or writing.
Now we're going to get into reasons why the SAT actually may be a better option for you,
even if we're in this environment in which there's not a ton of prep material.
First, Khan Academy is offering free SAT prep.
So if your parents do not have the money to shell out for a class, for a private tutor,
and you happen to like that interface, you like that online learning thing for the SAT,
that might be a good reason to prep for the SAT instead of for the ACT.
The second reason that you might want to take the SAT is if you were bad at the science
section of the ACT.
And if you take the ACT and you bomb that section or you're really inconsistent on that
section, you might actually want to take the SAT even though there's not a gob of prep
material available for you.
The third reason why taking the SAT might be a better option than taking the ACT would
be if you're really bad with time.
The ACT is a really tough test when it comes to time, meaning that you have to finish in
a certain amount of time, and if you don't finish, it doesn't matter how good you are
at getting questions right.
At a certain point you're going to run out of time and you're not going to be able to
get all of those right.
And finally, the other reason why the SAT may be a better test to prep for than the
ACT is for a select group of students who are already scoring, and I would say the top
2-3% of students on either one of these tests, and you think that it's possible that if you
prepped enough, you could become a National Merit Scholar.
A National Merit Scholar is someone who scores in the top one-half to one percentile, to
maybe top one percentile in the country on the PSAT.
So, if you are a top performer on these tests, you think you're going to be a superstar and
do really well, and you want to prep for the PSAT, you might not want to then go and prep
for the ACT because that's annoying, then you've got to have a whole other test to prep
for.
In that case, if you're prepping for the PSAT, and then taking the PSAT and you do really
well on it, go ahead and then take the SAT.
That makes sense.
So, to recap, you might want to take the SAT if you are going to prep online and take advantage
of Khan Academy, if you do not like the science section of the ACT and aren't very good at
it, if you have trouble finishing individual sections, or if you think you could be a National
Merit Scholar.
There's a few cases in which it really doesn't matter which test you take, even with the
new test.
And that's number one, if you're just going to walk in cold, you're not going to do any
prep whatsoever.
Who cares?
It's on a curve!
Like, just pick one, and walk in, or pick both, and walk in, and take both.
I don't usually recommend that - I don't think it's actually a great way to go, you should
probably take two practice tests for 8 hours because that won't cost you a bunch of money
that the tests will cost you.
And the other reason when it doesn't really matter is if your scores are about equal and
you're only going to do modest self prep.
Remember how I told you there's 4 free exams available for the new SAT?
Well, if you're not going to do more than 4 exams, you have enough material to prep
for it, and you can just take the SAT and it's fine.
And finally, the other reason when it totally doesn't matter and when you can rely a little
bit more on which one you're scoring better on, would be if you have a very highly skilled
professional tutor, a private tutor, that's coming in to work with you.
They're going to be able to read those four tests that have been released with you and
still be able to coach you in a way that's probably going to be valuable and help you
up your score there.
This is usually the litmus test that I use no matter who you are, in order to figure
out the answer for you to this question, is that you should sit down and take a full length
ACT exam.
And then you should sit down and take a full length SAT exam, and figure out: which one
do I do better on?
We're going to put the download links in the comments section below so you can get a copy
of each of those tests.
There's a concordance table available, based at least on the old SAT, that matches up what
percentiles are equal to what percentiles on the tests.
So, at least if you take both of these tests, you see which one you do better on, you can
compare your scores, and that should be a good starting place for you to help make this
decision.
That being said, that's about it.
We're going to be putting out more videos, so stay tuned to SuperTutorTV, subscribe to
our channel, like us on Facebook, follow us on Twitter, and check out our website.
We have a cool website up at supertutortv.com, we have blogs, we have more videos, and I
will see you all next time.
Bye!