SAT / ACT Prep Online Guides and Tips

You will usually see one conic section question (though no more than one) on any given ACT, but just what is a conic section and how do you solve it? Luckily for us, though conic section questions are rare, they are generally straightforward and can get you an easy point if you take a few minutes to study them.

This will be your complete guide to conic sections—what they are, how you'll see them on the test, and the best way to approach these types of ACT math questions.

You may be wondering how your SAT score is determined. Where does that score of 200-800 on each section of the SAT come from? What does your SAT score mean? Or, maybe you're familiar with the concept of raw scores, but you don't know how your raw score is converted into a scaled score. Hopefully, this article will answer your questions and clear up any confusion.

In this post, I'll clarify the difference between raw scores and scaled scores and provide charts that show the SAT raw score conversion to scaled score. Furthermore, I'll explain why the data from these SAT score charts can be helpful to you in your SAT preparation.

So you want to be proactive and save for college. Maybe you’re a high school student who wants to build up a college fund for yourself, or maybe you’re a parent or family member who wants to save for a young loved one. No matter your situation, you’re taking a proactive step in making college a little bit more affordable.

In this post, I’ll discuss the things you need to know in order to build, keep, and grow college savings. We'll discuss the five best ways to save for college to lower student debt on graduation and take a load off your mind.

First, though, I'll talk about the question you should be considering before you implement your savings plan: how much should you be putting away in the first place? Read on to find out!

As college costs continue to rise, financial aid has become a necessity for most college students. Ideally, the listed cost of attendance won’t deter you from applying to or attending the college of your dreams. Knowing about the process will enable you to maximize the amount of financial aid for college you receive and prevent finances from becoming an impediment to reaching your college goals.

In this article, I will define and explain the different types of financial aid that are available for college. Furthermore, I will explain how colleges determine your eligibility for financial aid, and I’ll offer you guidance and resources to make sure you know all the different types of aid available to you.

When should you ask for a recommendation letter? Many high schools answer this question for you with an official timeline and procedure for your rec letter requests. In addition to school policy, your teachers might also set rules around how and when to ask for letters of rec.

This guide will go over the most common recommendation letter guidelines, as well as some not so common ones that you hopefully won’t encounter (like a lottery system!). To start, let’s consider which guidelines are set on a school-wide basis and which ones fall into the realm of individual teachers.

The college application process can be a long and difficult journey for high school students. Organizing your application materials well in advance and paying attention to deadlines is critical. You should also start researching colleges earlier rather than later so that you can account for each school's specific application requirements.

In this infographic, I've broken down the actions you need to take to be prepared for college applications starting at the beginning of your junior year through to your senior spring.

Colleges ask for all different numbers of recommendation letters. Each college sets its own policy, so it's always a good idea to double check each school on your list to make sure you understand exactly what it wants.

Typically, colleges want you to send a recommendation letter from your counselor. Additionally, they may ask for one, two, or, in rare cases, three letters from your teachers. This guide will go over the different guidelines so you know how many recommendations to collect when applying to colleges. First, let's go over the different options.

Going to a diverse college offers many advantages. At diverse colleges, you’ll be exposed to a wide variety of people and be given an opportunity to learn from people who are different from you. If you know you want to go to a diverse college, how do you find diverse colleges? Which are the most diverse colleges in the United States?

In this article, I will provide you with a list of the most diverse colleges. Furthermore, I'll explain what makes a college diverse, the benefits of going to a diverse college, and how to determine if a specific college is diverse.

Along with researching your colleges’ deadlines and requirements, you also need to figure out exactly what each one’s policy is toward recommendation letters. Some schools may ask for one or two letters, while others may actually prohibit them outright.

This guide is meant to help you locate the crucial information you need. First, we’ll go over the questions you need to ask. Then, we’ll take you through the process of searching for this info, step by step. To begin, what do you need to know?

The definition of a "good" SAT score is tough to pinpoint. It depends significantly on the types of colleges you're looking at and how much you've improved from your baseline scores.

The infographic in this article will go through statistics on the national level and at different colleges to give you a better sense of what a good score might mean for you. This data should help you to see your score from a more informed perspective and decide whether you need to keep working on it to make improvements.

If you're doing well on the ACT but you still want to improve, it can be difficult to find the right prep strategies. High scorers who hope to become elite scorers will benefit from different study strategies than low scorers.

In this article, I'll go through what it means to be a high scorer on the ACT, why high scorers can benefit from their own set of preparation strategies, and which strategies will give you the best chance of improving already impressive test results.

The ACT allows for guessing without penalty (no negative points here!), but how can you turn guessing into the best strategy to maximize your ACT math score? The more you can increase your guessing odds, the better off you’ll be. And we’re here to show you how.

We’ll go through when and how to guess strategically on the ACT math section as well as show you examples of how to guess most effectively in action.

Have you been falsely accused of cheating on the SAT or ACT? What can you do if you're accused of cheating at the test center? What can you do if you're accused of cheating after you get your score? How can you fight it if they have evidence against you? Will you not get into any colleges? What are the best and worst case scenarios? I'll answer all of these questions below.

It's important to learn how to use official SAT practice tests as study resources because they will give you the most accurate reading of what to expect on the real SAT. If you only have twenty hours to prepare, this guide will teach you how to use practice tests to your best advantage within that limited time. I'll walk you through why SAT practice tests are important and how you can use a step by step twenty hour plan to get the most out of them. 

If you only have a short time left to study for the ACT, using official practice tests can help you raise your scores quickly. In this article, I'll take you through a 20-hour ACT prep plan that uses official practice tests to hone your skills on the test. This approach will show you exactly what you can expect on test day and help you to identify and address the most pressing weaknesses in your test-taking strategy. Below, I've broken down the most effective way to get the swiftly get the greatest benefit from practicing with official ACTs, as well as explained the benefits and drawbacks of this type of prep program.