My daughter...

[thinkerlady[$]]

is now registered to take the SAT's for the first time in January. Boy do I feel old--to have a child old enough to take the SAT.
Anyhow--as you can imagine, our house is busting with SAT talk these days. Hubby and I are remembering our SAT experiences--fond memories as they were.

So I was wondering for any of you who have taken the SAT however many times--any memories???

I took them 3 times, and always got a larger math section that a verbal. I hated math then. I remember the room as always being freezing cold, and I couldn't concentrate!!!! I remember the booklets as being very intimidating--back in my day we didn't have prep courses, and PSAT was optional. I of course didn't take PSAT--but I guess my SAT scores were ok to get me into college and ultimately grad school.

[jenninca]

I took the SAT once, and should have had the scores cancelled. Here's my horror story....

I was signed up to take the test at Ohio State. My friend's dad, who WENT to Ohio State, took us there, and it took us half an hour to find the right building. We got to that building, and they sent us to another building. We got to the second building, and they sent us to a third building. At the third building, the second half of the alphabet was sent to a fourth building.

The room did not have any left-handed desks. The desks were tiny ones, so it wasn't like I could just use a right-handed desk. They finally had me sit at one desk and use a second desk to write on.

Since I had two desks, I had to sit at the back, right against the window. It was a blustery day in early spring, and the window was permanently stuck open about half an inch. I had a strip of cold air blowing on my back the entire time. When I put on my jacket, I'd get too hot and have a hard time writing around the bulk of it, but when I took off the jacket, I'd freeze.

And to top it all off, the state track meet finals were going on directly outside that partly-open window. I had to listen to cheering through the entire test.

Needless to say, I did not score well. Fortunately, all the colleges I applied to accepted ACT results.

Cindy

[tipu]

Originally posted by thinkerlady
So I was wondering for any of you who have taken the SAT however many times--any memories???

Once: 12/94 while in Dubai; couldn't afford to take it more than once. i didn't have much time, since my mid-terms were at the end of the month. Due to time constraints i didn't do anything for the mah portio except familirize myself with the structure of the test. i remember memorizing the words from the commonly occurring word bank and driving my brother Nipu crazy making him check my memory while he was trying to work on his mid-term studying... that was about all i did besides take the practice tests i'd scrounged up.

Think i took a few hours over three weeks for the SAT... then came mid-terms, so i had to take TOEFL cold in 1/95. i did about the same thing in 4/99 with the GRE, though since it was during the second semester of my senior design project, i could give two weeks this time...

... fun times, bit o' a break from what was going on in school.


Best of luck to your daughter Ang!

[kurt_messick]

I only took it once. Did slightly better on Math than on Verbal. I remember being upset that I didn't know there were prep books, etc. before I took the test. My school wasn't prepared for me to take at my age (14), and gave me no help at all. Despite that, I scored higher than anyone ever had before at that school. :p

For those who are interested, Mensa will let people in based on SAT scores (I can't remember the cut-offs, and they are different for 'older' tests versus 'newer' tests; apparently there was some revision of the test that skewed results higher -- grade inflation even with the SAT!)

[mjfrombuffalo[$]]

The full amount of studying I did for the SAT's was going through a few practice exams from one of those test-prep books the night before the test, while I was babysitting a 7-year-old and a 5-year-old. Don't remember the actual test situation except it was at my high school. Took it in 1983 or 84, and that's one of the years for which Mensa will accept SAT scores for admission, including my 1290 combined score.



mj
who's sorry about the bragging but has been having a horrible week and needs to pat herself on the back for SOMETHING, dammit!

[taurusmoon]

My son will be taking it in the spring and likely a couple of times next fall.

Alas, he (based on his PSAT score) is as bad a test taker as his mother.

I'm praying he gets an athletic scholaship.

Sara