Give us a week — we’ll push you ahead!
Fill in gaps from classes you took last year, or preview major topics in challenging classes you’ll be taking next year- Get ahead in the college admissions game
- Learn how to manage test stress and academic anxiety
- Improve all your study skills
- Get Your CommonApp DONE
For the Smart Summer Sessions schedule and to register, click here.
NOTE: Courses listed below that do not appear on the Schedule/Registration page can be scheduled, enrollment permitting, at your request. Please call (860) 519-1000 or email summer@collegeprepexpress.com
COURSE DESCRIPTIONS
- CommonApp Boot Camp
- Academic Courses and Study Skills
- Standardized Test Prep
All Smart Summer Session classes meet 3 hours/day, either 9AM-12PM ET or 1PM-4PM ET, for a total of 15 hours of instruction and practice. They classes all feature intensive, hard-hitting instruction with built-in time for work and individual attention.
Get most or ALL of your CommonApp done BEFORE the school year starts. Whether you take this class or not, this is excellent advice. This class will walk you through EVERY section of your application, help you craft stand-out essays, activities lists, and short answer responses for each of the schools on your list. See our CommonApp Boot Camp page for more details.
Precalculus Review/Preview
This class is intended for students who either have completed a Precalculus class in school and want to review before moving on to Calculus, or for those going into Precalculus in the fall. Topics include: functions and their properties (parent functions, inverses of functions, combination of functions, and transformations); conic sections and their graphs (circles, parabolas, ellipses, and hyperbolas); Trigonometric functions and their graphs; simplifying expressions and proving identities using Trig functions; law of sines and law of cosines; exponential and logarithmic functions; parametric equations and polar coordinates; and binomial expansion theorem and sequences and series. While the class is geared toward the standard Precalculus high school class, special attention is given to topics that frequently appear on standardized tests, like the SAT, ACT, and SAT Subject Test Level 2.
STANDARDIZED TEST PREP
PSAT/SAT Prep and Practice
This class offers an intensive 5-day immersion in the content, strategies, and test-taking skills necessary to excel on the PSAT and SAT. The course makes sense for any sophomore-senior who plans to take the PSAT or SAT in 2013-2014. Using CollegePrepExpress’s time-tested study program and copyrighted materials, students will begin to study the substantial body of knowledge covered on the exam and practice taking tests in a simulated testing environment. All three sections—Critical Reading, Math, and Writing, including the essay writing portion of the exam for SAT students (students will received detailed, individualized feedback on their essays), are covered in detail. Students will receive a substantial amount of printed material in class, but they are also required to purchase the CollegeBoard’s Official Guide to the SAT and are encouraged to buy Princeton Review’s Word Smart.
ACT Prep and Practice (See also our academic year format, 6-Session ACT Prep Class, in West Hartford and online on the Classes page.)
This class starts by introducing students to the main differences between the ACT and the more familiar PSAT/SAT, essential strategies, and the finite body of mathematical and grammatical material tested on the exam. All five sections of the exam–English, Math, Reading, Science, and the optional Writing section–are covered in detail. By the time students take, go over, and study ALL FIVE PRACTICE TESTS in the required book, they will be fully prepared for everything they’ll encounter on game day.
Materials: Students need to purchase The Real ACT Prep Guide (3rd Edition), the best source of practice, available in most bookstores that carry standardized test prep book. Participants can get a head start by reading/studying the review sections in The Guide, but they should not start taking the practice tests until the course starts. Students should bring the following to every class: their text books, notebooks with plenty of blank paper, a calculator, a pen, and a #2 pencil.
Take ONE WEEK to work on your GRADES instead of your TAN! 😉