August 25, 2018 SAT, the day a leaked SAT was used officially August 30, 2018 17:59

About the video: I was interviewed by ABC TV here in San Francisco about the SAT leak.

If you’re studying for the SAT now or have taken it recently, you’ve probably heard about the colossal failure on the part of College Board–the SAT given in August of 2018 was a repeat of an SAT given previously overseas.

To make matters worse, that test had apparently been “leaked” in PDF form to the Internet (probably as early as 2017), meaning that it was widely available to anyone who knew how or where to look for it. (I have never seen the test, but I have seen discussions online about it.)

College Board has a policy of not commenting on the “specifics of question usage and test administration schedules”, so this is all unconfirmed, but ample evidence supports the conclusion that it was the same SAT given in October 2017 in Asia.

Why it’s bad

I think it is fairly clear why reusing a large part or all of a previous SAT test is at best problematic and at worst massively unfair–those who have seen, taken, or practiced from that test before have an extreme advantage when taking the test.

One of the most common methods of studying is to take many practice tests and review them. If you’ve done your studying properly, you will see where you went wrong and remember your mistakes. If you happen to see that question again, or even a similar one, you should get that question right.

Furthermore, it is common in some places to “share” tests for studying purposes. In some cases, this “sharing” is done on a very large scale.

In a word, a very high number (but certainly not the majority) of students had seen, taken, and reviewed this particular test before they took it last August 25. But more students had not, and it is these students who are at a disadvantage.

How do we know that the SAT was leaked?

As I said above, College Board has not confirmed that the August 2018 SAT was recycled from October 2017, but there is simply too much anecdotal evidence showing that it was. Online, in the usual places, you can find people saying that they had seen the August test before.

A quick search of Twitter and Reddit shows:

And I’ve personally heard at least three different students tell me that someone in their test room last Saturday told them that they had seen the test before. For example, one test-taker announced, when the test was over and he was on his way out, that he had taken the test before, upon which the proctor politely dismissed the class except for that one test-taker. (Well done, sir!) Another student told me that, after the test, someone was showing people his copy of the test on his phone.

How do SATs get leaked?

Most people who take the SAT have never seen that test before. Or the questions on it.

However, that doesn’t mean that some people somewhere don’t have access to a particular test beforehand. In fact, there are entire operations devoted to getting copies of these tests or “reconstructing” them after they’re administered.

Here are the common ways that SATs (as well as a few other high-stakes tests) are compromised:

• A corrupt proctor steals a test or copies it during the administration of the test.
• Huge numbers of students take an official SAT; each is assigned a section to memorize and then recreate later that day back at the lair of the company that organized the group.
• A test-taker will covertly photograph pages of the test.
• A test-taker in one time zone will contact another test-taker elsewhere to divulge parts of the SAT.

For the record, I have not seen this happen anywhere in San Francisco, nor do I know anyone who has engaged in this sort of activity. But it does occur in some places.

What will College Board do?

This is turning out to be a public relations disaster for the nonprofit College Board. Especially after the controversy of the June SAT (that one was too easy, resulting in lower-than-expected scores), College Board needed to deliver a hitch-free testing experience in August. That didn’t happen.

College Board, again, is neither confirming nor denying the reuse of the test. However, they are stating that they will scrutinize the test answer sheets to find cheaters (my term, not theirs). This is actually standard practice for the College Board, but you can bet that they will be especially cautious for this test administration.

As of now, College Board is maintaining that nothing will change, and scores will be released as scheduled on Sep 7, 2018.

Some students fear that their scores will be canceled. (That's the rumor going around amongst the high school kids.) I honestly cannot envision that happening—there's simply too much at stake for too many people, and College Board can't just cancel the scores of the 200,000-300,000 people who took the SAT in August.

How does College Board determine cheating?

How does College Board decide that someone had previous access to the test? There are several ways that I have heard of over the years. First, College Board will look at your previous SAT or PSAT scores if you have them. If your score improvement is significant, College Board may decide to withhold your scores while they investigate further. In this case, you will get a notification from College Board informing you that they are going to examine your scores more closely.

The second method that I’ve heard about (and this was a while ago, so this may not happen any longer) is that College Board will compare your answers with those seated next to you. Presumably, if there’s too close a match, one of you will be suspect.

I can speculate on a third method, but it makes sense to me—a close analysis of your performance would indicate how you typically fare on certain question types. For example, if your weakness is permutations in math or inference questions in reading, and you suddely jump in those question types, your answer set may get flagged. Of course, if August was your first sitting of the test, this method would not work. (And again, I am only surmising here.)

So in terms of numbers, what sort of increase could trigger this warning? In the past, our students who have raised their scores about 500 points (yes, it’s possible with hard work) have been singled out. Fortunately, in all but one case, the students later had their scores released. (For the one whose scores were not released, the student admitted to me that he had had some sort of unfair advantage.)

In the end, however, no matter what College Board says, there will almost certainly be people who did not cheat who have their scores canceled and conversely, those who did who don’t get flagged.

The worst-case scenario and what to expect

If you’ve never taken the SAT or PSAT before, and you didn’t have access to the test beforehand, you should be safe.

However, if the following apply to you, you need to be prepared:

• You’ve taken the PSAT or SAT before before, and you studied really, really hard for the August test and had a good chance of raising your score. In other words, if you have a big (but legitimate) jump in scores between administrations, you may become suspect.
• You took the PSAT before and didn’t really try very hard, and in August, your score jumped.

Consequences—in the past, both with the SAT and other tests I’ve coached (GMAT, GRE, and TOEFL), the following could happen:

• A suspect set of responses could be withheld and then released as usual.
• A suspect set of responses could be withheld permanently, after which:
  • A student could be offered the chance to retake the SAT; presumably if the score is close, the student can keep her score (perhaps the higher score?).
  • A student’s scores could be canceled, and the student barred indefinitely from ever taking the SAT.

I’ve not heard of the last situation, neither with our students nor with students I’ve read about. However, there was a GMAT mini-scandal some years ago in which a handful of test-takers were banned from ever taking the GMAT again. (Please note that College Board is not associated with the GMAT in any way.)

Of course, if someone is prohibited from taking the SAT, he can just take the ACT instead. Or apply to U Chicago!

Why did College Board resuse the test?

College Board has largely remained mum on the subject, but has spoken about the need to reuse questions in the past, but not an entire test. The reason for reusing questions would be to cut costs—I’ve seen an estimate online that estimated that it could take up to 30 months and cost up to $1 million to prepare a single SAT test. College Board has also said that they can’t just whip up a new test in short order; presumably, it’s a lengthy process that needs to be planned far in advance.

While reusing a single test item or a handful is perhaps excusable, the reuse of an entire test is not. To make matters worse, as stated previously, this test was readily available online. (Note: A lot of people are stating that it was available only in Asia. I’d like to point out that if it’s on the Internet in Asia, it’s also online outside of Asia. Plenty of students outside of Asia had access to it.)

A reporter asked me why College Board would reuse an entire test. I’ll tell you the same thing I told her—no one but College Board knows for sure. However, my educated guess is that they were aware of the situation but could not reasonably cobble together an entire SAT in time to administer a new SAT in August. In this scenario, the alternative would have been to put out a sloppy, under-edited test, which would likely have put College Board in a very unfavorable situation. At least in this case, College Board can blame illicit behavior on some unknown bad actor.

I saw an old comment from College Board online that said that if they did use a new test for every administration, the cost of the SAT could double. People already complain about the SAT testing fees, so College Board is probably not too keen on raising that fee. I do know that the GMAT and GRE cost $250 and $205 respectively to take, so the SAT’s fee of $47.50 sure does seem inexpensive by comparison.

What will happen in the future?

For sure, the security of the SAT will increase in the future. College Board is already shipping some tests to certain testing sites in locked containers. This may mean more security while taking the test as well, though in this particular situation, that wouldn’t have helped a whit.

I can also only imagine College Board will attempt to speed up the process of moving the SAT to computer, which would be a massive undertaking and frankly, perhaps not feasible for the numbers involved with the SAT. For most of you reading this now, if the SAT moves to a computer-based test, it will likely happen long after you’re in college and are finished with the SAT stage of your lives. (I remember some rumors of moving the SAT to computer around 2000.)

It is also possible that universities will start requiring their own admissions tests; the University of California discussed this at some point back in 2001 (which was one of the reasons the SAT changed in 2005).

What will TestMagic do?

If you prepped with us for the August test, and you need to retake it, we’ve got your back! This applies to both students in our group classes and doing one-to-one tutoring with us. Just get in touch, and we’ll get you sorted.

Final thoughts

This story is still unfolding and there will surely be protests, petitions, complaints, and changes to come. We’ll keep you updated, and we also ask that you also get back to us if you’re one of our students. We’re here to help.

Where to download official SAT practice tests August 21, 2018 17:09

So you've heard that official SAT tests are the best source of SAT practice material.

Here's where to download them.

What to do the day before your official SAT October 23, 2017 13:55

Your SAT (or ACT) is tomorrow. You’ve got to do your best. You’ve been studying for months. (Or not!) You’re probably at least a little bit nervous about your test. (Which in fact can actually be a good thing. More on that a little bit later.) What should you do during these last 30 hours or so?

We’ve put together some last-minute tips for you based on our two decades of experience. But first, a caveat: We are giving advice based on our experience with thousands of students over about two decades. However, you know you best, and shouldn’t do anything that you know will cause your performance to suffer.

Now our advice:

Sleep nine hours

If you’re like many of the teenagers that I see, you go to sleep with three digits on the clock, and wake up at 6 or 7 AM. (You probably know that this is not healthy and not conducive to optimal learning.)

I would like to suggest that at least for the night before your test, you try getting a normal night’s sleep. Teenagers, who are still developing mentally and physically, need lots of sleep to help this development. A teenager needs at least eight hours of sleep a night. Don’t believe me? How late do you sleep during vacations, when you have nothing scheduled? I don’t know about you, but I remember one glorious summer when I slept till 11 AM every day. That was great. I woke up feeling rested every day, full of energy. You should treat yourself to this extra sleep the night before your test.

So try to sleep what you know is the right amount for you – nine or 10 hours is not unreasonable. I know that there is a certain element of machismo associated with pulling all-nighters and being able to attend class after sleeping only five or six hours, but for this high-stakes test, please do yourself a favor and get a proper amount of sleep.

Make sure you know where the test center is; leaver earlier than you think you should

This is a simple one: Make sure you know how to get to the testing center. Whether you’re being driven, you’re walking, taking the bus, or whatever, make sure that you know how to get where you’re going, and where to park. Remember that there may be heavy traffic on the weekend. I know that many of you will be taking the test at your school, so that may be ideal, since you’ll already be familiar with the location.

However, many of you may be taking the test at a completely unfamiliar location. Imagine that you are running late, and you’re having trouble finding the place, or there is road construction in the area, and you can’t get to the test center. Even if you make it on time, you may be stressed out before the test, which could put you in a bad mood for the next few hours.

If you’re taking the test at a new location, make extra sure that you will get there on time, and if you want to go the extra mile, scout out the location the night before. On test day, leave 10 to 20 minutes earlier than you think you should. In some places, weekend morning traffic is heavier than weekday or evening traffic, so you could face a delay.

Reminder: It’s always best to register for the test as early as you can so that you can get a good location (ideally you want a modern site that’s near your home). We’ve had quite a few students register late who had to take the test in another city, which can also add unnecessary stress.

Tip: Waze (as of 2017) is a cool mobile app that updates quickly about traffic, accidents, construction, etc.

Supplies

I’ve had a few students tell me that they showed up to the test only to find out that their calculator had no batteries. One student even asked, and I’m still not sure whether he meant it as a joke, “Why didn’t you tell me to check my calculator batteries?”

So here I go:

• Make sure your calculator has fully charged batteries.
• Make sure you have at least two sharpened pencils. (Note: The rules state that you may not use mechanical pencils, probably because it is too easy to rig them up for cheating.)
• Make sure you have erasers. (Quick tip: On the essay, if you make a mistake, cross out the words instead of erasing. Sometimes imperfect erasure leaves fine grit behind that can worsen the scan quality and make it hard to read your pearls of wisdom.)
• Make sure you have a watch to keep track of the time. Yes, the proctors have a very strict script that requires them how to announce the time remaining, but I have heard of many irregularities. Also, I did have one student who told me that her proctor would not let her wear a watch to the test, even though the rules specifically state that you should wear one.

Snacks and water

You very well may get hungry during your test. Be sure that you have something to munch on. You should know what works best for you – fruit, chocolate, nuts, trail mix, etc. Just be prepared.

The same with water – make sure you have some drinking water available to you in case you get thirsty. Be careful! Don’t drink so much that you need to take a trip to the restroom during the test. Proctors don’t like that!

Admission ticket and ID

Of course you cannot forget to bring your admission ticket and your ID. Without those, you can’t get in.

Test-day jitters

Feeling nervous about your test? Well, guess what? This can actually be a good thing. Turns out that research shows that little bit of nervousness can help you pay attention more and raise your score. Too much, however, can be distracting and can lower your score. The Harvard Business Review has a good write-up on the connection between nervousness and performance.

Ultimately it’s up to you to decide what’s best for you, but keep in mind that it’s normal to be nervous, and may even be beneficial.

Last-minute studying

The standard advice for many test prep experts is for people to relax the day and night before the test and not to study. However, I have had many students who do not follow this pattern. Some students like to study right up to the test, and some have even crammed during the ride on the way to the test.

I would suggest that you at least consider taking it easy the night before, but if you think it’s better that you study, go for it.

Irregularities in proctors

Finally, the proctor’s rulebook is so thick (figuratively speaking) that most proctors will deviate from the rules at some point during the test. I’ve heard many stories of proctors making mistakes, forgetting to announce how much time is remaining, not letting people use the restroom, etc. over the years.

Some proctors are very vigilant, and will walk up and down the aisles while students take tests. Other proctors will sit up front quietly doing their own thing while students take the test. Some proctors are friendly, others are more businesslike in their demeanor.

If you have any unusual or serious deviations from what you think should be done, you should notify College Board, and they will investigate. It’s unlikely that anything will be done (being honest), and you won’t get extra points, but you will be putting pressure on College Board to do better in their training, and you might feel better about making your voice heard. Complain to College Board about a problem on test day.

Of course, good luck! You’re going to knock it out of the park!

Why we're moving towards shorter SAT-prep courses May 15, 2017 14:51

In recent years, however, college admissions have become sometimes brutally difficult and ever harder to predict. Where in the past a 4.0 student from Lowell would be virtually assured of admission at one of the top UCs, now nothing can be taken for granted.