Students usually take the ACT and/or SAT two to three times, will begin prep no sooner than upon the conclusion of their sophomore year, and prefer to be finished by the end of their junior year.

We understand that most students wish to be finished with their testing in the summer after their junior year so that they can turn the page and begin working on their personal statements, essays, and applications.  A lot of colleges and universities have early decision deadlines of November 1st, so, if possible, you would rather not have to submit an incomplete application that shows a score still pending from a final effort in October of your senior year.  When you factor in sports, clubs, activities, part-time jobs, AP/ACC courses, and so on, the junior year becomes very full, very quickly.  Having a plan in place for your standardized tests ahead of time can help smooth out a few wrinkles that might otherwise turn into huge hurdles.

Don’t panic! Please call our office at 314-344-9010 to discuss how we can help.

Every senior’s story is different and also presents different opportunities and hurdles.  Although test prep typically begins in the junior year, many circumstances might alter this timeline for your student.  We are here and happy to help put a plan in place for these cases as they come along.

Strategy-based test prep breaks down standardized tests into their question order and pacing first, while content-based test prep focuses directly on subject matter. 

There are two different schools of thought when it comes to preparing for standardized tests.  The more common is content-driven prep, which is designed to review foundational principles of the subjects that constitute the ACT and/or SAT exams.  Content-based test prep can be very helpful, especially if your student has struggled a bit with any of the subjects included on the test.  Many students find content-based test preparation to be a positive experience overall, even if it does not necessarily move the needle on their ACT or SAT score, because of the detailed review of the subject matter.  However, there are two limiting factors inherent.  First, if your student wrestled to master one or more of those foundational concepts in their class(es) the first time around, a short review may not be enough.  Even if there are only a couple of basic grammar or mathematical principles that present a bit of trouble, the pace of content-driven prep seems to be much too fast for concepts not quite grasped right away and too slow when plodding through those concepts which are already well-known by your student.  Secondly, if your son or daughter mastered all of the basic principles just fine, has the A in the class to prove it, but is now missing 15% or more of the questions on an ACT, a content review will usually do little to bridge that gap.  It is not uncommon for students to begin content-driven prep with the best of intentions but eventually fade away from it or drop out altogether, labeling the pace of the class or the tutor either too fast or too boring – or both! – but rarely do they consider it just right. 

The second school of thought is that which breaks down standardized tests into their statistical and pedagogical goals, analyzes their structure, and develops strategies for either removing or hurdling the pacing roadblocks built into each section of the test.  This approach is called strategy-based test prep and is the foundation of what we use here at Kleitz Education Group.  Although Dr. Kleitz did not invent this approach, he has created a significant number of new, different, and highly effective strategies for both the ACT and the SAT over the years.  He’s worked to develop specific and unique tactics so that the students are practicing the strategies, even as we help address any possible content weaknesses and deficiencies as much as possible within the time available.  The idea is to combine essential aspects of content-driven prep – but solely on an as-needed basis – with what we believe are the very best tactics necessary for success on these tests. 

All of our tutors are trained by Dr. Kleitz and use his approaches to the exam; his strategies, techniques, and methodologies feature in every appointment, in every course, in every syllabus.

Private tutoring capitalizes on a student’s individual strengths in order to move the score as much as possible, and classroom or group prep must focus on offering strategies that are likely to work for most of the students much of the time.

When Dr. Kleitz or any of the Kleitz Education Group tutors prepare an individual student for an ACT exam, students usually work one-on-one with their tutor for somewhere in the range of 14 to 18 hours and do 2-3 hours of homework for every hour of tutoring.  Most students arrange for this tutoring to be completed across the course of two or three different administrations of the ACT exam.  We see something similar with the SAT, in that students meet with their tutor for 12-15 hours and have 2-3 hours of homework after each appointment.  Our SAT students also spread their tutoring out over two or three administrations of the SAT exam. 

The Kleitz Education Group does not use contracts or tutoring packages for one-on-one tutoring – families pay only for the time that their students actually need and use.  Many students are able to reach their goals in significantly fewer tutoring hours than the average, and we absolutely love it when that happens!  Our goal is to have your child complete the tutoring in as few hours as possible so that he or she peaks on test day.  This may mean that a student and tutor end up agreeing to cancel a scheduled session or two, perhaps, or even that a tutor will request that an extra time may be found in order to add another session or two in an effort to align the tutoring more closely with the anticipated test date. 

Our private test prep tutors meet with only one student at a time, and all of the tutors are able to cover every area of the applicable exam (Verbal and Math for the SAT; English, Math, and Reading, as well as the now optional Science section for the ACT).  About 50-55 minutes of the student’s hour with the tutor will be interactive, with the tutor reviewing the student’s homework from last time, introducing and explaining new strategies, and addressing any specific content weaknesses or deficiencies.  This will find the student both asking and answering questions, analyzing misses, highlighting successes, reviewing goals, etc.  There is almost always a stretch of time, maybe 5-10 minutes, when the tutors ask students to work through a few sample problems to check for understanding.  This is done to demonstrate that any new strategy or strategies are absorbed before the student is off to do the homework at home on their own time (and not on your dime). 

When test preparation is done in smaller groups or in a classroom setting by the Kleitz Education Group tutors, the goal is to have roughly 12 hours of course instruction scheduled to help handle the additional questions raised by having multiple students tutoring together.  As with private tutoring, the classroom time is pretty interactive, with much of the time together spent analyzing homework, asking and answering questions, introducing and demonstrating new strategies, covering common content deficiencies, and so forth. The students will still have 2 to 3 hours of homework in between each meeting of the course.

Classroom-based or group preparation is not necessarily the best test prep format for all students.  If your child has already been granted or will be requesting testing accommodations (such as extended time or untimed pacing and/or will have scribes, readers, etc.) and/or is truly underperforming on the exams, then you might wish to reach out to us immediately to discuss alternative approaches to his or her testing preparations.  It may be that group prep will still work quite well for your son or daughter regardless, but we want to have that conversation beforehand and be certain. 

A conversation prior to enrolling in a group course is also beneficial if your student has scored 1280 or above on the PSAT10/PSAT/SAT and/or 27 or above on his or her practice ACT.  These students usually need a much more specific level of assistance to break through to the 99th percentile scores that tend to be their goals.

Private tutoring is more effective and efficient overall, but, without a doubt, classroom-based tutoring is the more cost-effective option.  We completely understand that and continue to offer group courses in order to help as many families as possible.  Please do not hesitate to ask us to help break this down further in light of scores, goals, and availability, not to mention your family’s budget.

Our private tutoring rates begin at $75/hour and can go up to $300/hour; group classes range from $545/course to $995/course.

The fee for private tutoring with a Kleitz Education Group tutor depends upon a tutor’s years of experience with their subject matter, their time with our company, their familiarity with Dr. Kleitz’s methods, and their students’ successful score improvements.  Our tutors are professionals in their own right and in a variety of areas – lawyers, doctors, professors, and engineers, just to name a few.  It is possible that a tutor will be relatively new to ACT prep with us and be only $100/hour when preparing high school students for an upcoming ACT; however, because she is a physician with med school and years of clinical experience behind her, she may be $250/hour when prepping a college junior for the MCAT.

•     Academic tutoring for high school students starts at $75 per hour.

•     ACT test preparation starts at $100 per hour.

•     SAT/PSAT test preparation starts at $175 per hour.

•     GRE, GMAT, MCAT, or LSAT test preparation starts at $150 per hour.

Please do not hesitate to ask us for details about a tutor’s time with our company and his or her average score improvements. 

Our in-house group options range from $545 to $995 per student, depending upon the material covered, the duration of the course, class size, and the experience level of the tutor.  The fees for in-school and after-school courses offered by our tutors at many area schools and colleges differ, sometimes significantly so, due to the amount of supportive funding provided by the host school.  Although a number of schools will offer our courses at no cost whatsoever to their students, most schools/districts require the participating families to pay some portion of the course fee.

For individual ACT prep, our average score improvement is over 4.5 points; for individual SAT prep, our average score improvement is a bit over 190 points.

According to ACT’s own research, the average score improvement for students who spend roughly 25 hours with a tutor is just under 1.5 points.  The College Board reports a similar change, that, after a minimum of 20 hours of tutoring, the average score improvement is not quite 60 points.  Here at KEG, we are quite proud of consistently returning an average score improvement that is three times the national average, especially since it usually happens in only about half to two-thirds of the number of hours spent tutoring. 

Our average ACT score improvements are comprised of students who do indeed only go up 1 or 2 points, as well as students who move their scores 6 or more points.  As a company, the Kleitz Education Group average score improvement is 4.5+ points for private tutoring students who are pursuing full-prep and usually over two or three administrations of the ACT exam.  This is true whether a student begins with an 11, a 21, or even a 31, and anything in between.  Over 60% of our one-on-one students see an improvement of either 4 or 5 points.  Many parents find this reassuring, as it indicates that our 4.5+ point average improvement is not the result of a few, oddly fantastic score improvements that are raising the entire group’s mean.  Rather, it is representative of solid, consistent, routine improvements.  SAT score improvements are very similar – around 60% of our SAT prep students see an improvement of between 180 and 200 points over the course of two or three administrations of the exam.

The average scoring scale is a bit different for classroom prep, as the instructor needs to keep the class moving at a pace that is effective for most of the students in the room.  Our average score improvement at the Kleitz Education Group for classroom-based preparation is approximately 2 points, and this holds true whether a student begins with a 16 or a 26, or anything in between.  As indicated earlier, students who are coming to us with a score of 15 or below, or someone beginning with a 27 or above, may wish to discuss their scores with Alli or Jane prior to enrolling in one of our courses or smaller groups.  SAT courses see an average score improvement of roughly 80 points, and students coming to us with a score of 880 or below, or someone beginning with a 1280 or above, may wish to chat with us first.

It is quite rare for our students to see no improvement at all, but a stagnant score does happen once in a great while, as much as we wish it could be otherwise.  Even if a score does not budge at all on the first or second test, with additional practice and repetition within the testing environment, almost every student will eventually see a score improvement on test day that is more in line with their practice scores.  Quite often, the student does not even need to meet further with the tutor for this process, as he or she knows exactly what to do and is able to do it in practice routinely, and our tutors are happy to give the student as much practice material as they could possibly want to continue drilling on their own, with more and more repetition.  Sometimes, the parents and students do choose to continue meeting with one of our tutors – almost serving more like a coach at this point – to give the students someone to whom they can be accountable in terms of completing practice sections.  The additional practice and growing confidence finally pay off, and the needle will move on their scores.  Less than 10% of our students have this happen to them (needing a fourth or further test to see their score improvement materialize on test day), but the end result is still an average score improvement of 4.5+ (or 190+) points; it just takes them an additional exam or two to get there.  

Unfortunately, sometimes the anxiety or self-doubt that a student is battling will be simply too ingrained to be overcome, and, despite the combined efforts of student and tutor, there is no score improvement at all.  Again, these situations are rare (fewer than 100 students out of the 20,000+ students with whom we’ve worked), but they do occur.

You probably do not have to take Writing, but, at least for now, you may wish to plan to take Science, just in case, or check with your preferred colleges and universities to see what they are saying about this change.

In 2025, the Science portion of the ACT became optional.  This news is recent enough that many colleges and universities are still trying to figure out what they want to do about it.  Some schools are saying that there is no need to take this section at all; others are still requiring it; others are only requiring it for certain majors; and many will do something different for the Class of 2027 and future graduates than what they have opted to do for the Class of 2026 as the change was being implemented.

The fact that Science is no longer computed as part of the composite ACT score is fantastic news for some students and truly heart-breaking for others.  We are already hearing chatter that ACT Science may turn out to be like the ACT Math section at some schools in terms of determining the first math course you take at the college.  For instance, some universities may assign you to something of a gen ed science course if you do not have a science score, just as they will automatically put you straight into a gen ed math course if you entered test optional or without a math score already at a certain predetermined minimum score. 

The best advice that we can give when it comes to this latest wrinkle in the saga of standardized testing is two-fold:

1. Check with your preferred school(s) regularly – a simple review of their admissions websites with some frequency should suffice in most situations – so that you are able to see if they have ironed out their own plans for the question of “To Science or Not to Science?”.  If you have definitive ideas about your major, you’ll want to do a deeper dive into whether or not, for instance, the College of Engineering is still requiring a score in Science, or if the Department of Fine Arts, as another example, is not requiring it. 

2. If you are nowhere close just yet to choosing your school or declaring your major, then be at peace and do not worry!  You may choose to take the optional Science section, though, simply so that you have it no matter what you decide, declare, or determine in the months and years to come.  In these cases, please also have a quick chat with your tutor about whether or not it makes sense to prepare and practice for the newly optional Science section of the ACT.  There have been quite a few students in the past few months since this change who have opted to take Science but not spend time or money preparing for it.  We completely understand that and are absolutely fine with removing Science prep from your tutoring to-do list.  As with any facet of tutoring here at Kleitz Education Group, we only want what’s best for you and your family.
   

Now for the optional Writing section of the ACT:  Each year for the past several years, more and more of the schools around the country have dropped their requirements for the Writing section of the ACT.  We are now down to fewer than 1% of all the four-year colleges and universities that will ask for the ACT Writing.  Double-check your preferred schools’ admissions websites to be safe, but you will most likely not need to worry about the optional Writing assessment. 

Word to the wise on Science, Writing, and AI:  We have heard – and discovered for ourselves – many situations where using any sort of search function or AI-aided researching about the optional Science and/or optional Writing sections of the ACT has resulted in inaccurate information.  Our best advice, while things are still in flux and settling down from these recent changes, is to go straight to the admission website of your preferred school or schools.  That way, you are seeing the most current information about their stances on these different issues, rather than any sort of outdated and/or aggregate answer.

Via the ACT.org website for ACT and/or the CollegeBoard.org website for SAT.

To register for a standardized exam, you first need to create an account for your student on either the ACT.org or the CollegeBoard.org website, whichever represents the test you wish to take.  Although ACT and SAT suggest that the process takes about 40 minutes, we want to warn you that it might in fact be more likely an hour or two, simply because you will be asked for all of your student’s high school course information and grades by semester, which may not be easily accessible.  You will also need to upload a headshot photo for the admission ticket your student must print and bring along on each test day.  Students are regularly turned away from test sites for a poor photo or an improperly uploaded photo, so it’s worth the time spent to do it correctly.  Once the regular deadline has passed, there is usually a 2-week window in which you can register late for a test.  An additional fee is assessed for late registration.  Please reference ACT.org or CollegeBoard.org for official testing dates. 

Call and chat with Alli or Jane!

Preparing for the PSAT looks much like preparing for the SAT, with the PSAT itself often standing in place of one of the aforementioned administrations of the SAT.  There are significant pressures associated with success on the PSAT when in pursuit of National Merit Commended Scholar or National Merit Semi-Finalist Scholar status, so having a detailed conversation with Alli or Jane about your student’s starting scores and goal scores will help shed some light on how best to navigate this aspect of standardized testing.

Dr. Kleitz has spent years helping students in their pursuit of the National Merit awards, and he encourages families to consider minimizing the stress of PSAT day by using a real SAT as a dry-run a few weeks prior to the PSAT at school. Most students will follow up their October PSAT at school with a second national SAT exam in either November or December simply to solidify their best possible SAT score for college admission purposes.  Some of our students began calling this the “PSAT sandwich” – the in-school PSAT being sandwiched between two national SATs – and the name has stuck around over the years.

Registration for the PSAT is handled via each high school, and the processes for doing so can vary quite a bit from one school to another.  Please be sure to speak with someone in your College Counseling department and/or the administrative offices at your high school for more information.

Absolutely!

Alli and Jane are always willing to chat with you about your student’s situation in greater detail, and we are happy to lend an ear if you simply need someone to play the devil’s advocate.  We may not have all of the answers, but we are familiar with some of the questions that you will want to discuss with your teenager.  With those questions in mind, we will always do our very best to help you develop a plan to navigate this whole process.   

The Kleitz Education Group office hours are from 9am to 6pm, Monday through Friday, and we are also available most Saturdays from 11am to 2pm.  In fact, Alli is frequently in the office from 7:30 or 8am until nearly 8 or 9pm on most weekday evenings.  Please do not hesitate to give us a call and speak with us right away!