If I were getting ready to embark on any journey or purchase and knew up front that not taking an intentional, measured, planned approach would cost me at least 50% more time and money, I’d STOP and rethink the plan.
One survey by Finder calculated the average college bound journey to cost $4,688: college visits, testing, test prep, applications, and more.
Taking an official ACT or SAT for a “trial run” to "see how you test" before embarking on test prep and serious testing is a costly mistake.
Following this proven path will save you time, money, and nagging with a teenager who doesn't want to test.....I get it - I wouldn't want to either.
- Get your baseline score from a free diagnostic test that colleges will never know about! We offer these at least every other month, if not more often. Your options are here with our other "free stuff".
- Based on your trial run, choose the ACT, SAT or both for your focus and register. Still confused? Sheri will help you figure it out - schedule a call at your convenience or email her (SheriElmore@LEAProgram.com).
- Take a prep course where your improvement over your baseline or previous scores is guaranteed! Group class and 1:1 customized options are found here.
- Take the first attempt at the ACT and/or SAT.
- Plan for a second attempt. 96% of LEAP students improve on their second attempt, while only 57% of all students nationally increase on a second attempt. Don't leave it to chance - exercise your LEAP guarantee.
- If necessary (not always the case), do additional LEAP prep to strengthen weak areas from the first test.
- Retest on the ACT or the SAT (not both!), and you should be finished with all testing in most cases. Now you can focus fully on college selection and application without the distraction and stress of testing.
The ACT and SAT without writing costs over $50 per attempt. With LEAP’s approach, you are looking on average at approximately $55 in testing fees since the state of Ohio now pays for one of your attempts! Test day time investment from the time you arrive at the testing site to testing with breaks is about 4+ hours. So the proven approach is 8 hours invested if you start by taking only one test or 12 hours if you take both on the first round which will at least double your cost.
For the family who decides to do a little experimenting and assessing before a calculated approach to testing, this almost always results in an additional testing attempt at the cost of approximately $55 and another 4 hours of precious time.
Our test data history since 1999 shows the typical student maximizes scores when they officially test twice after their initial prep. Of course, there are outliers for less or more testing, but we make our recommendations on what has worked for the vast majority of the thousands upon thousands of students LEAP has prepped in our history.
Experimenting results in a 50% increase in expense putting the price tag over $100 for the student-focused on one test. Doing both on the first round? Your total cost is now about 1/3 more on testing and 16 hours of time.
An additional concern is students do burn out when it comes to testing. Speaking from experience, when they hit the testing wall, they are finished and more testing, more prep do not reap the reward.
Save money where you can to help pay for college later.