Advanced Placement Program (AP)

The Advanced Placement, commonly known as AP, is a special program offered by the CollegeBorad  in the United States and Canada. This standardized test offers courses to high school students and is generally recognized to be similar to the courses in college. However, these courses are more rigorous than the courses in highschool. So any student who completes this test is supposed to have better understanding to the college courses. Colleges which participate and recognize this program give extra credit to students who obtain high enough scores. This test is also used in the admission process in some very selective undergraduate schools.

SAT: Scholastic Aptitude Test

SAT is the most popular standardized test used in the college admission process in the United States. (ACT is the second most popular test.) SAT is developed and administrated by the CollegeBoard.

This test, as mentioned by the Collegeboard, indicates the readiness of a student for college education. More precisely it is said to measure the literacy and writing skills that are needed for academic success in college. It consists of three different sections which are Critical Reading, Mathematics and Writing. Writing section is a new addition to the test, which was added only a few year ago. The full marks of each section are 800 so the total score of SAT is 2400.

ACT American College Test

ACT, which stands for American College Test is one of the two standardized tests accepted by most colleges and universities for admission purposes. The other test ofcourse is the SAT. The test has 5 sections with one being optional. ACT has a multiple choice section covering math, English, reading, and science. The optional section is the writing test in which the test taker needs to write a essay within the given time of 30 minutes. The 4 mandatory tests are scored individually on a scale of 1–36, and a Composite score is provided which is the whole number average of the four scores.