How Going to a Great High School can Negatively Affect your SAT and ACT Performance

You would think that going to a top-notch public or private high school could only help your performance on major tests like the ACT or SAT. Although having a top-notch high school education is indeed helpful for one’s performance on these tests, I have found that it occasionally can harm students as well!

The problem is that students from top notch schools expect that they should KNOW how to do all the problems. Why wouldn’t they? After all, they have excellent teachers and great academic resources. Many elite private school students with whom I have worked become easily frustrated when they don’t see how to solve things right away. What they need to realize is that the SAT and ACT do not test your knowledge – they test your critical thinking ability. If they tested your knowledge, they would be much more like the SAT Subject Tests or the AP tests. Colleges use the SAT and ACT to see how well students can problem solve with things they haven’t seen before. Having it set up this way gives students who do not attend really good high schools the potential to demonstrate that they have room for academic growth, given the right academic environment.

If you attend a great high school, don’t beat yourself up if you don’t immediately understand a problem or a passage – in your thought process you need to let things happen, not force them to happen. If you do not attend a great high school, know that the SAT and ACT will give you the opportunity to show your intellectual potential. I hope you found this discussion helpful. If so, I would invite you to share it with your friends.

Thanks, Brian Stewart