I teach for one of the big test prep companies. Prior to working for them, I always thought of test prep as something for the “pretty smart, highly motivated, not quite genius” crowd, i.e., those kids sitting on a 1200 or so that needed a 1400+ to get into an elite school. [This was before Writing was added.] In short, I believed it was for the over-programmed kids whose SAT scores didn’t live up to their parents expectations.

I was wrong.

My students now:
(1) Foreign-born students, often with stellar math scores, whose reading & writing scores reflect their difficulty with the nuances of the English language. **I think there’s room in the Test Prep world for a specialty company to target these students. ESL isn’t just for Spanish-speakers. Many Asian students live with host families through high school, specifically to prepare for entry into a US college.
(2) Students who are very bright, but do not test well. They need to learn the “game” of test-taking, and to trust their instincts on multiple-choice tests.
(3) Students who care very much where they will attend college, but prefer to learn with a group instead of self-study. A joy to have in class!!
(4) And of course, I always have a few that need the help but don’t really care to be there, sleep in class, and don’t understand why their scores don’t increase. One of these very students gave me the idea to take a photograph of sleeping students and email it to the parents shelling out $900 for the course!

Groups 2 and 3 are easiest to coach and mold their test-taking practices; they get huge score improvements. Since we teach to the middle, I think that Group 1 gets left behind somewhat in the Reading & Writing topics. I could carve a niche, focus on the ESL students (grouped by native language and/or recency of immigration), and create a new “middle” to which I’d teach. The course may need to be longer & more intense, but the impact would be phenomenal.

Trent, oddly enough when I saw the Money mag at Borders you were who I thought of first especially when I saw the title of the article that made you roll your eyes. If ever an article was designed for use with the ten second rule this one was it.

And oh yeah, I think the book club idea is neat but it might be redundant.

I disagree with the “pull everything out of stocks as you approach retirement” suggestion. I’d rather always have some percentage of my holdings in stocks, because the return is likely to be substantially greater than fixed income securities. I also think it is a mistake to assume that fixed income securities like bond funds are always less risky than equities–default on debt is possible, especially if you’ve got some subprime mortgage exposure…

!wanda, you are cracking me up: “if… your kid only hates you a little.”

My thoughts on SAT tutoring:
There is no substitute for actually knowing math, grammar, and vocabulary. The best way to build vocabulary is by reading high quality books and periodicals from an early age.

That said, I found buying an SAT prep book and the book “10 Real SATs” (or somesuch title) enormously useful. Even if you know math and vocabulary, reading the book and taking the many practice tests helps you be able to regurgitate the material quickly and automatically.

My parents bought a few sessions with a private college counselor, but only because my mom and I had so much friction over how I was completing my college applications, to the point where she spent all her time yelling at or hitting me and I was contemplating suicide. The counselor was basically a neutral third party who read over my applications and told each of us when we were being unreasonable. My counselor in public school would have performed that service for free, but she had restricted hours. And, well, the private college counselor was cheaper than therapy. If you are willing to help your kid guide their extracurriculars in a college-oriented fashion and complete the applications, and your kid only hates you a little, you don’t need a college counselor.

I would warn you that even “free” activities aren’t free. My parents must have burned a lot of money driving me to community service sites, academic competition sites, and school-sponsored sports events where my participation was free. (Public transit where I grew up was not good.) Then, there are the soft costs: the outfits I wore for recitals and college interviews, for example, were not free.

If you play the college game and get burned out, though, most college health services provide therapy for free.

Private SAT tutoring is not worth 5 figure payments, however it is not completely useless.

A great SAT score can make up for deficiencies in other areas of the application, such as mediocre grades or a semi-weak essay.

Yes, I am a private SAT tutor.