Junior Program

The Minds Matter Junior Program is dedicated to preparing high school students for college through SAT test preparation and Writing & Critical Thinking education.

For juniors, the Test Prep Program takes the form of a full year program leading up to the Spring SAT. Students are grouped into teams based on their individual development needs, with each team receiving personal coaching from math and verbal dedicated Test Prep Leaders. The curriculum familiarizes students with the SAT and ACT exams, provides test-taking strategies, refreshes basic skills, and provides several diagnostic exams to identify student strengths and weaknesses while reinforcing test strategies. In the 2006 - 2007 academic year, the average improvement was more than 100 points for students taking the SAT exam.

The Test Prep Program involves extensive hard work and dedication form both students and volunteers and would not be possible without the generous donations of Random House and Princeton Review who donate source materials and diagnostic exams.

In addition to Test Prep, juniors have the opportunity to polish their Writing & Critical Thinking skills. Building on the work done in the Sophomore Year, juniors continue to craft and refine their personal statements. Exposure to and discussion of short-form autobiographical works by writers like Maya Angelou will help students think about different and creative ways in which they can tell their own stories. A debate series in the spring allows students to further hone their critical thinking and public speaking skills.

A teacher to mentee ratio of 3:1 ensures high-quality, comprehensive feedback on weekly drafts of personal statements for summer program applications. In addition, mentees draft weekly responses to articles covering a range of domestic and international political topics from such sources as the New York Times and the Economist.

Minds Matter, Inc.
1120 Avenue of Americas
4th Floor
New York, NY 10036
info@mindsmatter.org
212.626.6584