there is a future and it is coming welcome to our second installment my name is mrs alexander and today i have with me mrs heather was in iraq who is a guidance counselor at the peters township high school this afternoon we're going to be talking about high stakes testing i'd like to introduce you to mrs wars in iraq ok so this is wars in iraq oftentimes students come to my office and they ask questions about testing and some of the things that they or their parents may not be aware of is that we started a few years ago instituting the p s s s can you tell us a little bit about it what we use it for sure the p s as it is new it is actually a retired p s a t exam that we give to all ninth graders in the school late winter early spring of their freshman year so basically it is a practice as a t exam a practice p s a t ok so how does the student benefit from getting that exposure to that test in one third it's practice taking a standardized test a lot of times just found the research shows you know more practice more exposure to the testers helps them be ready for their tenth grade year for their eleventh grade year when they have those college entrance exams that when it actually counts actually the scores help them see what areas they may be lacking in and just where they can improve their skills going into their tenth grade year and going into eleventh grade year great so we also offer them the tenth grade the actual p s a t correct correctly any student to take that we pay for all students so what then can students do with the scores from ninth and tenth grade they can see from ninth and tenth grade where they've grown and maybe what areas they may need more improvement upon the p s a p is great once they get their scores back typically early december they take the test in october it's a once a year test they get their scores back in december and it's a week they get their textbooks back also it's a very detailed score report so it will show them what questions they got right and what questions they got wrong so that they can see where their skills are where they meet need to improve what areas either in math or their verbal areas where they need to improve those a lot of information it's a great i think is a great thing so they can look at that and make a comparison i know one of the things that i always caution students to be mindful of is if you are an algebra two student and you take that test in the fall chances are good that your scores are not going to be what you want them to be in the math area so take heart don't don't get your panties in a twist about it it's  is have to pay so they can choose to take and or choose not to take it again practice another so this will be there are essentially their third exposure to a standardized test same with the results you get your test book back in december and you get your detailed report so again you can see where you were and tenth grade and then you can see almost a year later where you were where your skills have improved proved upon again for the national merit scholarship for juniors really they're your last practice before you're ready to take the s a t s and that's where it counts for college admission so the ninth and tenth grade scores are not reported to anybody other than the parents and the students themselves so we don't report them and there's a summer program that they they ask for them mentioned about the math some students are juniors are still in algebra two so we want them to wait until the spring because that way to get more english exposure more vocabulary more practice but also that math practice now we do have some students that maybe you know in pre calculus as a junior but we still kind of want them to wait and so maybe january or march of their junior year just because of the more the more vocabulary the more english exposure the more writing exposure it really there's no need to say go back to your teacher your english teacher or maybe your math teacher but i say wait until you get the results and tell you you know how well you did so you could pull it apart and maybe go to them and that might be the first place where you want to check in and say can you help me with this i miss this particular type of course a number of times with this particular kind of math so i that's another i think good reason why they should wait until the spring and it does it does count it does become part of their testing record i think there are some  choice depending on your timeframe a lot of students don't have don't feel as prepared because they are in sports and but if they can take it twice their junior year that that would be great because there is a test day in october of their senior year is more of a last chance because if you think the fall of your junior or your senior years when you're applying for college right so again testing calendar depends on a lot of different factors because you also have testing going in there were a student at sydney's so you did mention  the scoring so if you don't want to over test because like you said the scores are not going to very much after you've taken it three times so some students are coming and saying wow i heard this is super scored as it's super scored what are the score and there's something else there called score choice what what are our bets does that mean to them when you take this eighty it becomes a record so there's you know you take it twice there's two record test states you can send your entire testing record so both testing dates and the college if they super score they will take the best out if you had a best verbal for march and a best math for june they will super score get the best score choice is choosing one test date so you would only send your march test dates are there for the college would not be able to super score because you're only sending one but that you may have done that might just be really you know the scores that you're looking for right it's a really again depends individually and what the college is doing so it's important for students to understand the difference between super score and score choice so super scoring is where the university's allowed to look at the best verbal piece from one test and perhaps the best math from another use those if you are looking for score choice then you just submit the one test right ok so that's good the other thing that comes up and i know that i always caution students as they enter into junior year it can be a pretty hectic year because many of them or involved in a number of a p courses honors courses in addition to extra curricular activities just everything that they do so one of the things that comes up is ok let's plan out your testing eighty two subject tests can you tell the viewers what they are and why they are our long subject specific tests so they have them in science biology chemistry physics to math levels there's a u s history and there's world language those are required by certain colleges so that's why it's important to start in the junior year again to add to theirs their stress unfortunately is to start thinking about what college they are looking into if they are looking into more competitive or more are more ivy league schools they would require strongly recommend an s a t to those cannot be taken on the same day that you take the s a t reasoning exam so that's another testing month that they would have those are typically in june or nothing to them throughout the you can do them throughout the year a lot of our students will take them in may or june because for example if you're an a p u s history and you're thinking about applying to an example  you can take the u s history subject test in may because it's essentially when you're preparing for the a p test and towards the end of the course as well again not required by all schools a lot of times it's two to three they require and again it could depend on the majors so if you're a science major a lot of times they will ask you in engineering they will ask you to take a math science or maybe one of your choosing so for some of our students who might double up for example on math and or science if i'm a tenth grader and i'm taking bio or eleventh grade or do you need to buy a i finished that at the end of the year that's the best time for me to take them while it's fresh in my mind if there's a chance or looking at a more competitive place so recommendation is usually for the competitive schools t sometimes three and the best time to take those would be right after you've taken that a p course it's you know makes sense because it's fresh in your mind but there's no i mean of course the student could always take it as a senior if they have no idea it would just be right companies the college board or versus the z t two totally different tests a c t is more than team a test testing you on what you know there is a science component it's scored completely different it's on a scale of one to thirty six there is some on that exam as well and just how do you not penalize for certain you know if you have a wrong answer it's just completely different in the writing is also optional on the c t o ok so test could be the first time taking an s c t you go to a more familiar location the proctor may be more familiar you may actually be testing in a room that you have class just to kind of ease that testing anxiety you know where to park you know where the but if indeed you can't make it work with all of your other requirements that you've got going on you could actually go to another school yeah you can do it and those states are also on the college board online right when you go to register if we don't offer the test you type january and they're coming in and they're asking a lot of questions and they're always shy go early decision or should i go early action what can you tell us about early decision versus early action and how a student might approach making that decision early decision is binding binding contract mom and dad have to sign something a contract student has to sign something counterpart your council has to sign it so it is a binding contract you get into whatever school you're applying to early decision that the school you're going to essentially you have to withdraw all of your other applications so it is binding it's a contract so you really have to be certain that that's if you get into that school that's where you're going to go early action typically just means you apply fill out all your applications you know it's just about if it ok so one of the things that i always tell kids when they asked should i do want to the other night's play and how it's binding to them you know that i threw out the question is money an issue for you have it's an issue if your parents are comfortable saying you could go to sixty thousand dollars school without batting an eyelash then you know have at it otherwise if you need to consult be concerned about how much to wish and they will   there's profiles for the school with testing requirements to ation information and college major information all of that so nobly on says all fairly new we ran it out last year but as i say this is his second year so we know more about that one of the features i really like about that is that students could go into navi aunts and their s a t s course will be uploaded their p s a t scores are uploaded and they can use a certain part of that that will allow them to see based on on those scores today these are schools that might be a good fit for me but i might be you know i might get into right right right right on this data points just to give them a more realistic colleges in their reaches or you know lot of data points good that's good information because sometimes i hear information about well our kids don't get to go to the school or that school and i know that's not true i know because i've known students who've been accepted so it always becomes did with the with our audience if you have any further questions about opportunities to learn more about college decisions you can visit the high school website you can get on through family connection or through  either one it's the same thing actually family connection and avianca the same thing but it's a wonderful tool that has a plethora of information that families are invited to explore more of death in depth if you're not comfortable with n at this time you can always go on to college board and see some information there as well or the first option always be call my guidance counselor and ask my guidance counselor call them e mail them stop in and make an appointment to visit with your guidance counselor so