As much as everyone loves to hate standardized testing, I developed many essentials skills from constantly practicing for the ACT and the SAT that still help me today in making decisions and being more productive.

1. Speed Reading

With there being so many platforms for entertainment, education, and current events, the majority of our time is spent on these platforms. Since I found out about medium, I use the medium to get the majority of information and entertainment now instead of youtube. The developed the habit of speed reading when I prepared for the ACT and the SAT; I have never looked back since then. I use it every day. Speed reading allows me to use Medium effectively to obtain the maximum amount of information in the least amount of time. With youtube now encouraging creators to make videos longer than 10 minutes to be able to maximize earnings on pieces of content, watching each video on youtube has become a big commitment. Why would I watch a 10–12 minutes video on how Elon musk spends his day if I can just skim through a medium article and get the important information while ignoring the unnecessary information in about 1–2 minutes. Reading a piece of writing while only focusing on the important information is an essential skill that guarantees productivity. Practicing ACT/SAT passages repeatedly enforced not only reading quickly but extracting the overall idea of the reading at the same time.

2. Analysis of Charts, Figures, and Tables

It would be wrong to say that the skill of data analysis of charts, figures, and tables is only provided by standardized testing; these skills are also provided by many other high school courses, but ACT and SAT emphasize being able to analyze a figure quickly. During the current pandemic, a tremendous amount of data is thrown at us, but the skill of being able to analyze these data without reading an article that explicitly states the importance of the data comes from preparing for standardized testing. For example, when you look at the table below, how can you tell which country is affected the most by this pandemic? Is it the country that has the highest number of affected people? Anyone that studied well for the ACT would know to look at the ‘cases per 1M people’ column to determine the most affected country.

3. Grammar

As an ACT and SAT tutor, I get students all the time that do not know the basic grammar rules ( I am talking about something as simple as it/its/it’s or usage of commas). Even high school English courses don’t emphasize specifically on grammar. Studying for the ACT and SAT makes students better writers without them even realizing it.

I am not implying that these skills can only be earned from preparing for standardized testing, but standardized testing is the only common learning experience in all of America that teaches these essential skills. These are essential skills that a high school graduate and a STEM major with a bachelor’s degree would both have. Although ACT and SAT scores are considered useless after being admitted into a university, the learning that comes from these tests provides you with essential skills that everyone uses for the rest of their everyday life.