One-on-One Tutoring Blog
In the Beginning The Academic Approach story begins with its founder, Matthew Pietrafetta, as a PhD candidate and instructor at Columbia University in New York City. While simultaneously teaching core curriculum classes to Columbia freshmen and tutoring high school students for the SAT and ACT, Matthew took note of significant challenges that were facing these […]
Many students struggle to find productive ways to fill the summer. For the past four years, Academic Approach has provided Chicago students a way to not only to fill time but to thrive academically: The College Readiness Summer Seminar. This program provides an accessible place for students to further their academic skills while gaining exposure […]
Professional development time for teachers can be incredibly valuable and rare. However, recent research has found that much professional development for teachers may not actually be useful in improving effectiveness in the classroom — ostensibly its primary purpose. In a large-scale longitudinal study of three districts’ investment in professional development, TNTP found that only three […]
“I had no clue what that problem meant.” “I got confused — what does the mean mean?” “They can do the math, but they can’t understand the word problems.” “That problem was way too wordy, so I skipped it.” When you work with students in an SAT or ACT math prep course, you realize […]
Controversy has existed for years around the subject of SAT and ACT accommodations, and that controversy seems to revolve around three critical themes: 1) Equity—Are all deserving students receiving fair access to SAT and ACT accommodations? 2) Legitimacy—Are the accommodations the right ones for the specific diagnoses? 3) Validity—Do these SAT and ACT accommodations […]
“I can’t believe I went up 12 points on the ACT! Cannot believe it. Crying with happiness. Wow!” After 20 years of helping students grow their ACT and SAT scores, finding an email like this at the top of my inbox still brings me the greatest joy. More satisfying still is that this email came […]
In March, ACT announced fall 2016 reporting enhancements that include two major changes: • A redesign in the look and feel • The replacement of current sub-scores with more comprehensive reporting categories aligned to the College and Career Readiness Standards and The Common Core Today, ACT released the first views into those reports and details […]
College Board recently updated its website to reflect the release of scores for the first Redesigned SAT given in March. The updated information includes new benchmarks—revised from those initially released with PSAT data in January—as well as concordance information for the redesigned SAT to the old SAT and to the ACT.
ACT has announced enhancements to their reporting that will be first released this fall. These enhancements include two major changes: 1) Redesign in the look and feel of the reports, and 2) Replacement of subscores with more comprehensive reporting categories aligned to the College and Career Readiness Standards.
On March 22, ACT released their response to the encroaching SAT Suite of Assessments: the PreACT. Designed for 10th grade students, the PreACT is a slightly shorter version of the ACT, mirroring the scoring and scaling of the full test but clocking in at an hour and 55 minutes of testing time.