Tag Archives: college admissions

What is a good SAT score?

Each student taking the SAT wonders about what score would be a good one. Is 2100 good? Or would only a perfect 2400 be considered a good score? However, instead of asking what score is a good one, perhaps the more important question is to ask, “Which college do you want to go to?” Different colleges have different SAT score ranges amongst their admitted applicants. Some colleges have an average admitted SAT score of 2250, whereas other colleges have an average admitted SAT score of 1950. There really isn’t one set ‘good’ SAT score. This is the first thing any student must remember.

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New SAT Changes – Good or bad?

The new SAT has sparked a furious debate on whether these changes are good or bad for upcoming high school students. Many people are disgruntled with the SAT College Board not because of these changes, but because the College Board has shown its lack of clarity and irrelevance in crafting the old SAT in the first place. For example, the essay portion, which was added in 2005 with great enthusiasm as being an integral component of the exam is now made optional and no longer heralded as crucial. The multiple thousand vocabulary words that every high school student stressed out over is now promoted as an unnecessary part of the SAT. They have also removed the previous scoring system of deducting a quarter point for every wrong answer to multiple-choice questions.

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Should I Study SAT Vocabulary?

How am I ever going to finish memorizing these 1000 vocabulary words for the SAT?  Is this even important for the SAT??? The SAT vocabulary used to be a large part of SAT prep. After all, if you could confidently memorize all those SAT words, you could have a perfect score on the SAT vocabulary section. Yet, nowadays, with analogies and antonyms gone from the SAT, studying for the SAT vocabulary only become directly important for the Sentence Completion part under Critical Reading. It seems that vocabulary has become less important in the SAT.

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How Many Times Should I Take the SAT?

I’ve often heard things like, “Oh man…I missed my target score of 2300 by 20 points, should I retake the SAT to get the score I want?” or “The second time I took the SAT, my score improved by 50 points, should I try taking the SAT a third time?” Some students believe that they have nothing to lose by taking the SAT multiple times until they have achieved their ideal score, or gotten too tired of it. Yet, aside from the 4 hours each time you take the test, registration fees, and emotional and mental health, there are other factors why there is a limit to how many times you should take the SAT.

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The College Application Essay: Part III

essay_writing_100-Last week we discussed some tips for getting started on your college application essay, after debunking several myths about the application process itself. By now, hopefully you have brainstormed enough and are feeling ready to pick up a pencil and begin writing. Grab your ‘First Impressions’ sheet we began last week and let’s get started!

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The College Application Essay: Part II – Getting Started

whats_your_storyLast week I debunked several floating myths concerning the college application process. Now let’s consider some more specific prompts to get the juices flowing with regard to writing that (overhyped) application essay.

[Keep reading for college essay writing tips!]

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The College Application Essay: Part I – Myth or Fact?

common-appWhether you are a high school senior in the agonizing throes of the college application process, or a sophomore simply curious about what has been called “the most stressful fall of your entire life” (disclaimer: it’s not!), it’s time to debunk some myths. Once you have the facts, you will certainly be one step ahead of many out there!

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Want to teach in China? Princeton Tutoring is hiring!

Princeton Tutoring is looking for a variety of teachers and college consultants for exciting, rewarding, and well-compensated positions with our partner organizations in China. These are immediate hiring needs, and we will be making offers on a rolling basis (so apply early!).

Annual compensation is highly competitive and commensurate with experience. All positions include housing assistance, airfare allowance, training, and a generous amount of paid vacation.

Available Positions:
1. College Consultants – URGENT!
2. SAT Teachers
3. AP Science (Chemistry & Biology) Teachers
4. SSAT/SAT Teachers

Please visit www.princetontutoring.com/international for detailed job descriptions and application instructions.

Princeton Tutoring Essay Competition

Princeton Tutoring is sponsoring our first annual essay competition! (For additional competition details and rules, please visit http://www.princetontutoring.com/essay.html)

The underlying purpose of this year’s topics is to foster student self-awareness. Additionally, thinking about these types of questions will prepare students for the types of prompts they might encounter on their college applications.

  • High School Topic – Do you believe there are inherent conflicts between achieving both success and happiness?
  • Middle School Topic – Interview your family members and discover something about your family history that you might not have known before. Write about the significance of what you learned and what it means to you.

[Continue reading for additional thoughts on these topics] Continue reading

Welcome to the Princeton Tutoring Blog!

by Greg Wong and Kevin Wong

Who are we?

Welcome to Princeton Tutoring’s blog! We are an elite private tutoring company headquartered in Princeton, NJ. Since 2005 we have helped hundreds of students improve their confidence, increase grades, and gain admission into selective high schools and top colleges.

Our tutors are the nation’s highest performing college students and recent graduates.  They are high school Valedictorians, National Merit Finalists, and National AP Scholars. They are Princeton Dean’s list recipients and published fiction, poetry, and academic journal writers. Outside of their work with Princeton Tutoring, they are teaching assistants, tennis coaches, and dance instructors. Extracurricularly, they are actively involved in community service, are varsity athlete team captains, and are accomplished Grammy-performing musicians.

What is the goal of this blog?

Over the past several years, clients and friends have turned to us for advice on a variety of topics – “How can my child improve his organizational skills?”, “Should my son take the SAT or the ACT?”, “Which extracurricular activities and how many should my daughter focus on?”, “What are some of our recommended methods for reducing test anxiety?”, and so on.  In each case, we would respond by sending a carefully drafted response to a single person. What if we could share that information with a larger audience so more people could benefit?

Our goal with this blog is to address the most relevant academic (and occasionally non-academic) concerns of middle/ high school students and their parents by sharing tips and advice from the unique perspective of our tutors. You can also expect to see blog posts from teachers, college admissions counselors, and educators who are affiliated with Princeton Tutoring.

How is this blog organized?

The ultimate goal of many of our readers will be to gain admission into a top college of their choice. Therefore, we have organized our topics around the major components that will make you (or your child) an attractive college applicant:

  • General study tips (e.g. study techniques, time management, reading and writing tips)
  • Standardized tests (e.g. SAT/ACT, AP, SAT subject tests)
  • Extracurricular activities (e.g. summer, during the school year)
  • College admissions (e.g. essays, school selection, alumni interviews)

How to use this blog?

Looking for a specific topic? Try using the search function. Alternatively, click on any of the categories/tags listed on the right-hand-side of the page to view related groups of posts.

If you’d rather have automatic updates every time we submit a new post, you can subscribe by email. We are initially planning to update our blog a couple of times per month.

Contact us!

If you have any questions/comments or if there is a specific topic you’d like to see, feel free to contact us at greg [at] princetontutoring.com or kevin [at] princetontutoring.com.

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Please visit www.princetontutoring.com to learn more about our Company.

Happy reading!

About the authors: Greg and Kevin are brothers and Princeton University graduates. They have over 20 years of experience in the educational services industry as tutors, mentors, and coaches. After several years as private tutors, they founded Princeton Tutoring in 2005 to continue their passion for education on a larger scale and to help more students achieve their potential.. Please click here for more information about Greg and Kevin.