The Journey to Enrollment

A Parent’s Guide to Private School Entrance Exams

There are many reasons why a private, independent, or boarding school could be an excellent option for your child.

• Private schools typically offer thrilling academic challenges, extensive STEM or arts programs, or other remarkable resources.
• Their student-teacher ratios are low.
• Their faculty usually have advanced academic degrees and strong professional reputations.

Canva generated this picture of an admissions director reviewing applicant files.

About 10 percent of students attend private schools nationwide.

• Private school admissions tend to be selective and in many cases competitive.
• To help distinguish applicants who meet admission standards, private schools use standardized testing.
• The Independent School Entrance Exam (ISEE) and Secondary School Admissions Exam (SSAT) are the most commonly used admissions tests for private, independent, and boarding schools.
• The High School Placement Test (HSPT) is often used by Catholic schools for entrance into grade 9.

The ISEE and SSAT are long multiple-choice tests lasting 2-3 hours and potentially covering above-grade-level content.

• For the 4^th grader applying to a private middle school, this might be the first time they have undergone two hours of solid testing with only one or two short breaks.
• The best starting point is always to have your student take a full-length diagnostic test.
• It’s important to know where your child is starting from so that you can help them get to where they need to be.

This video offers

Admission to a private school is a process with many components to it. Both the process and its many components can be confusing to parents dealing with private school admissions for the first time. So, I devised this article as a hub that includes all my articles describing the private school admissions process.

The Overview

Admissions to Private School: A-Z puts all the information you need to navigate the private school admissions process in one convenient place. Whether you are just beginning or have been through this before, you will find help and advice to guide you. Admissions 101 offers an overview of the private school admissions process and the steps needed to find the right private school for your child. Admissions Checklist will keep you on track as you work through the private school admissions process. Essentially it takes the points covered in the previous two articles and formats them into an easy-to-follow checklist.

5 Challenges To Getting Your Child Into Private School

If you are good at organizing projects, the challenges involved in getting your child into private school will not seem especially daunting. Bear in mind that this project will stretch over eighteen months or more.

Play the Hand You Have Been Dealt

In this article, I am suggesting that you need to be objective as you decide which schools will be on your shortlist. Card games such as Bridge and Solitaire with multiple decks of cards fascinate me. I have

Editor's Note: I am most grateful to Kate Fisher, who is an expert in admissions essays with Noodle Pros, for explaining how to handle the inevitable essay portion of your child's private school admissions application. ~Rob

If your child is applying to a private middle school or high school, he or she will likely have to write an admissions essay. It is important to remember that this is not a college admissions essay, which means that the standards used to assess your child’s writing ability are lower. However, this also means that it’s much easier for admissions officers to quickly identify essays that a parent, teacher, or tutor has had too heavy a hand in.

It is extremely difficult to disguise adult involvement in an essay that is supposed to be written by a child applying to middle school or high school. You may feel uncomfortable allowing your child to submit his or her essay without reading it over. If you choose to help him or her by proofreading or editing it, remember to make sure the language, syntax, and sentence structure remain age-appropriate. No private school admissions officer expects a rising sixth grader to write as well as an award-winning novelist, let alone a college-educated adult.

The best way to ensure the success of your child’s admissions essay is to show how to choose the right essay. Most private schools ask applicants to choose one prompt from a list of several. Helping your child brainstorm

Before you spend $5,000, $15,000, $25,000 or more annually for your child's education in a private school, do your own due diligence. Merriam-Webster's dictionary defines due diligence as "research and analysis of a company or organization done in preparation for a business transaction." https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/due%20diligence In a normal business transaction such as buying a house, you would probably concern yourself with the title search and a house inspection in the first instance. When evaluating private schools for your child, your due diligence will focus on the fit. You want to find the private school which offers the best fit for your needs and requirements. You want to identify a school at which your child will be happy. The due diligence steps which you take in a business transaction inspect and review tangibles. Due diligence for parents evaluating private schools includes tangibles such as the academics, sports, and extracurriculars as well as that all-important intangible which is how the school fits in with your requirements.

Avoid common mistakes.

When you visit schools, please don't make the following common mistakes:

• Being late
• Being dressed inappropriately
• Being unprepared
• Being over-prepared
• Being rude and disinterested

A little thought and preparation will help you make the best impression possible.

Visit schools.

Visiting schools is an essential part of evaluating the schools on your short list. There are several ways schools will arrange those visits.
This part of your due diligence can be great fun. You will set foot on the campus and explore the facilities of a

I asked the experts at Noodle Pros for suggestions as to how to improve quantitative scores on the commonly used private school standardized admissions test, the SSAT. Their answers follow. ...Rob

Four Noodle Pros give advice on how to improve your SSAT quantitative score:

1. Be thorough.

Write out your math as thoroughly and as clearly as you can. Even when you can do much of the calculation in your head, it helps a lot to have your step-by-step thinking on paper in front of you. Many times when you get lost or stuck, you can look at what you have written and find your way out of a jam. You can also find and fix the errors in your thinking or your calculation more quickly and more accurately when you can see the work in front of you. Don't do all your math in your head! - Brendan Mernin, 27 Years Tutoring

2. Be confident.

Students do their best when they feel confident. The challenge in maintaining good morale is that the difficulty of the exam can cause students anxiety. Remember that, according to the SSAT website, the SSAT writers design the questions so that only 50 to 60 percent of the test-takers get the question right. Help your child maintain a realistic view of what is expected, and take on preparation in reasonable “chunks.” Start by mastering the questions on content your child already knows, gradually pursue new content or new applications of content,