Expanding Our Horizons: Bringing Standardized Test Prep to US

Daniel Leonard '19, Staff Writer

The average US student has almost no free time during the week. In between the hours of homework, and the different teams, clubs, and groups that so many students are a part of, there is barely any time for additional tutoring for standardized testing.

ACT and SAT tutors are both expensive and take up large portions of time to go over test material at least once a week. Fortunately, a lot of the material that is on these standardized tests is taught in the classroom. The math sections are almost recreations of units covered during the school year. The English and history departments cover the English portions of the test in class. The science sections are always similar to labs or topics discussed in our science classes. So in order to succeed on these standardized tests, the student must brush up on his past knowledge of the material and know the strategies in taking standardized tests.

It would greatly benefit US students if tutoring was offered at school during the school day. Students could meet in classrooms during their opposite lunch to do practice sections, relearn material, and get tips on ways to do well on standardized tests. These small tutoring sessions could be run by US math, English, history, and science teachers so the use of outside tutors would not be necessary. Different subjects could be offered on different days so if a student wanted to focus on math, they would only have to go on the days that math tutoring was being offered. These sessions would greatly benefit the student body as they would be easily accessible resources for students to succeed.

Hathaway Brown uses offers ACT and SAT tutoring sessions during school and students say that these sessions are highly beneficial and appreciated. As their school is extremely similar to our school, this program would work at US just as well as it works at HB.

For such a prestigious school, it is frustrating not to have certain resources that are essential for success. The college counseling staff does a great job in creating college trips, recommending colleges, and helping each and every student on the journey towards picking a perfect college. But while they do so well in helping students during the college process, it is up to the student to receive high-standardized test scores, which are so important in getting accepted to prestigious colleges.

If this program were to be installed in the US curriculum, the average ACT and SAT scores would increase and it would be greatly appreciated by the student body.