Is your student a speedy test-taker who often makes mistakes?

This is our wonderful student Noah. When Noah first came to RTC, he was taking a full course load of AP (Advanced Placement) and Honors courses. He shared that he often found school easy to manage, which showed in his 3.7 GPA.  The college entrance exams, however, presented Noah with his very first academic challenge. ACT was Noah’s test, and his starting ACT Composite score was a 23. He was just starting to explore universities, but he knew a 23 wasn’t going to gain him admissions to some of the schools he was considering.  (23 on ACT is equivalent to 1140 on SAT.)

Noah wasn’t an anxious test-taker, but he had two things working against him: he was sacrificing accuracy to speed during the test in order to “just be done,” and he was admittedly a procrastinator when it came to schoolwork and studying. We were very honest with Noah: to see score gains on the ACT, he’d need to be hungry for them and willing to put in the effort to get there. He’d have to develop a strong work ethic, but if he was willing, we’d support him to help him get there. He decided he was ready to work hard for his dream and signed on.

Noah’s tutoring program started in-person in the spring of 2020. Only a few lessons in, the pandemic shut the world down, and the rest of his 1-2-1 tutoring was completed virtually.

First, Noah and his tutor tackled his procrastination by breaking his assignments up into smaller chunks that felt more manageable. His tutor also staggered his homework deadlines so that he wouldn’t feel like he had a mountain of work to climb each week.

Next, Noah’s tutor taught him strategies for managing his pacing on the test. Noah was a very speedy test taker, often finishing whole sections with minutes to spare. However, his speed often caused him to miss key information and make mistakes that cost him points. Noah’s tutor taught him how to slow down and take the time to be careful in his work.

This was tough for Noah at first. His mind would fight against slowing down, constantly telling him that he had to rush in order to get through the test. Noah’s tutor taught him how to use his favorite relaxation strategy to combat that. Over time, he began to learn how to decrease his pace by using his timer and RTC’s pacing strategies. He also started to utilize any extra time he had to go back to questions he was unsure about.

Around the halfway point of his test prep program, Noah visited Villanova’s campus and realized that this was the university he wanted to target. This motivated him, and he began to double down on his efforts toward his score goal. Guided by his tutor, he honed his study skills and strategies even further in the last half of the tutoring program. By his final full practice test, Noah was exceeding his Composite score goal.  Noah achieved his goal, scoring a 28 Composite and a 30 Superscore!  (That Superscore was important, because Villanova superscores.) (28 is equivalent to 1310 on SAT; 30 is equivalent to 1370.) All that work meant Noah was accepted to Villanova University! He was accepted to many fine schools, and is a member of the Class of 2025 of St. Joseph’s University’s Haub School of Business in the Honors Program. Congratulations, Noah!