SAT / ACT Prep Online Guides and Tips

If you don't have a traditional high school diploma, you can still earn an equivalent credential by getting your GED. But what is a GED? What does GED stand for? Basically, a GED is a credential that can substitute for a high school diploma. Since most employers (and all colleges) will require you to have graduated from high school, it's usually a good idea to get a GED if you don't complete high school. Doing so helps to ensure that you'll have access to more opportunities later in life.

In this article, I'll go through the GED meaning, the advantages this credential can give you, and how to get your GED.

Your senior year is coming up, and you're ready to blow those standardized tests out of the water once and for all. It's time to figure out the best study plan for you that still leaves time for summer jobs, shameful levels of ice cream consumption, and acquiring incomprehensible tan lines.

Follow these five steps to make the most of your summer studying before your SAT or ACT test date!

Many students get very hung up on GPA in high school - is it high enough? Will it pass muster in college admissions? What does your GPA even mean?

In this article, I’ll go through what GPA is, what GPA means, and how it can help or hurt you in the college admissions process.

Practice tests can help you get familiar with the structure of the AP Biology exam and feel more comfortable with the types of questions you'll be expected to answer on test day. Studying with practice tests can also give you insight into the specific struggles you might have with the material as presented on the AP test. You can then focus your studying appropriately to tackle these problems.

In this article, I'll list all the practice tests for AP Biology that you can find online and give you a few tips on how to use them effectively as study aids for both the AP test and any in-class tests you have throughout the school year.

Many high-achieving students end up taking both SAT Subject Tests and AP Tests during their time in high school. SAT Subject Tests are required for admission to most competitive colleges, and AP Tests and coursework are encouraged. Is one more important than the other? In this article, I'll give details on how these two types of tests compare to each another and whether it's a good idea to take AP Tests and SAT Subject Tests in the same topic areas.

You might be interested in going to a small college, but just how small is "small," exactly? In general, schools that are considered "small" have fewer than 5,000 students in total. However, quite a few schools are actually at least 10 times smaller than this!

In this article I'll describe the characteristics of small colleges and then provide a list of the smallest colleges in the nation by category. That way you can decide if going to a small school really is the right decision for you.

If you're coming up on your sophomore or junior year, you're probably wondering when you'll be taking the PSAT and how you should prepare. In this article, I'll tell you when the PSAT is offered this year, how to get ready, and how this relates to your future plans for the SAT.

If you're aiming for a really high SAT score, you'll need to learn how to beat the most difficult questions on every section of the test. Here, I'll go through a few of the most difficult questions I've seen on the SAT Reading section and how to solve them.

Why exactly are they so hard? How do you tackle them? How well will you do? Challenge yourself for that top score.

AP classes are typically more challenging than regular high school classes, but did you know that some APs are harder than others? Based on testing statistics and an examination of the curriculum, we can come up with accurate assessments of the true difficulty level of each AP class.

In this article, I'll analyze AP US History exam scores, student testimonials, and course content to give you a clear picture of how hard this popular AP class really is!

Before you sign up for any AP class, it's helpful to get an idea of whether you'll be able to handle the workload (and the exam!). AP Psychology is a popular AP class that's offered at many schools, so you might have the chance to take it at some point in your high school career.

But is AP psychology hard? Or is it a walk in the AP park? I'll tell you which factors go into judging the difficulty of an AP class and examine what they tell us about the AP Psychology class and exam specifically.

AP Biology is a popular AP class, and many students are curious about the challenges it presents. Is AP Biology hard? Will you spend hours upon hours studying for the class? Are you likely to fail the exam? Or are AP tests much easier than they seem?

In this article, we'll look at statistics, course material, and student perceptions to present you with a clear picture of the difficulty level of the AP Bio class and exam. We'll also give you some tips for figuring out how challenging AP Biology will likely be for you based on your academic strengths and weaknesses.

AP Human Geography is an investigation of how the human species has populated the earth and developed different cultures, political systems, and means of production. This is a subject that can be a little hard to pin down because it represents an intersection of lots of different information.

How does the College Board test such a wide range of topics? Continue reading to gain a better understanding of the lay of the land (so to speak) on the AP Human Geography exam!

AP World History seems like it would be a pretty hard class. There's so much to cover—I mean, it's nearly 1,000 years of global human history! But how much do you really need to know? And how do people usually do on the AP test? In this article, I will examine five different factors to make a conclusion about the difficulty level of AP World History.

The AP US History exam involves critical reading, writing, and in-depth analysis. It's not just about memorizing names and dates, but rather interpreting historical evidence quickly and accurately, recalling outside information on a topic, and synthesizing your ideas into a coherent argument.

In this guide, we'll give you a rundown of the format and structure of the AP US History test along with a brief content outline, sample questions, and some tips for a great score.

US News is probably the most popular source out there for college rankings. While US News rankings of colleges purport to be highly accurate, they can be misleading in certain important respects. If you make decisions based purely on the US News college rankings, you might end up being miserable.

In this article, I'll go over why you shouldn't make judgments about colleges solely based on their rankings in US News.