An Important Message to our Clients

The coronavirus pandemic has caused an unprecedented hardship to everyone’s daily life. Families that have school-aged children are facing an even bigger challenge now that school buildings are closed for the rest of the academic year and the kids are thrust into a remote learning environment. Parents are wondering how their children are going to be …

The Advantages of Taking the Regents Exams in Middle School

Regents exams are statewide year-end assessments on high school core subjects in New York state and passing them is a requirement for graduation. Almost all public and private high schools in New York are mandated to follow the Regents exam system. There are exceptions to this rule but for the handful of schools not using …

Getting Into a Specialized High School

All it takes to get admitted to one of the eight specialized high schools in New York City is a qualifying score on the Specialized High Schools Admissions Test or SHSAT. These public schools which rank among the most elite and high-performing high schools nationwide will only accept those students who score the highest on the …

Planning for College

Preparing for the costs and challenges of applying to college should begin, ideally, during the last year of middle school. If you're the parent of a college-bound student, you should consider playing an active role early on in the college planning process. In addition to saving money to pay for college, you should start discussing …

The controversy over the SHSAT

New York City Mayor De Blasio is once again proposing a drastic change to the admissions criteria at eight out of the nine specialized high schools. Currently, the only way to gain entry to these elite schools is to score high enough on a single exam called the Specialized High School Admissions Test (SHSAT). Mayor De …

Which is a better comparative measure of student achievement, the GPA or standardized test scores?

A recent study has shown that GPAs in US high schools have risen significantly while SAT scores have fallen - two conflicting trends that point toward grade inflation.  Grade inflation is the practice of artificially raising students’ grades by lowering standards. Examining the academic transcripts of high school graduates in the 18-year period from 1998 …

How much math is needed to ace the SAT’s math section?

When the SAT was redesigned two years ago, there was a lot of talk and debate as to whether the math section has Pre-Calculus on it or that it only goes up to Algebra 2. Many people had this notion that it could or should only go up to Algebra 2 since the usual math …

What families need to know about the NYC Middle School Application Process

Finding the right middle school for your child takes a lot of time and energy. You will need to do your research by reading up on the schools using the middle school directory published by the Department of Education, visiting the schools' websites or going to their open houses. The whole process could be daunting …

How to choose the right high school

Choosing a high school from over 400 schools and 700 programs in New York City can be a daunting task. With so many options, how do you decide on which schools to put on your high school application? Ideally, the process should begin in seventh grade since admission to most of the regular high schools …

What to expect on the new SHSAT

The newly redesigned Specialized High School Admissions Test (SHSAT) will be administered for the first time on October 21 and 22 of this year for current eight graders. Ninth graders will take it on October 29 and November 4. What should students expect to see on the test? The most drastic change to the new SHSAT is …