Thanh Hoa Nguyen Khuong Duy, 17 years old, achieved 1,590/1,600 SAT by practicing at least two questions every day, for nearly a year.
Khuong Duy, an 11th grade English major student at Lam Son High School for the Gifted, Thanh Hoa, received near-perfect SAT results in the mid-March exam. He scored a full 800 points in Math and 790/800 in Reading and Writing.
"I'm quite sorry for making a mistake in choosing the appropriate word for the context in the Reading and Writing section," Duy said. This was also the section Duy was worried about from the beginning because there were often questions about methods of conducting scientific research.
The SAT (Scholastic Aptitude Test) is a standardized test commonly used in college admissions in the United States. The test consists of 54 Reading and Writing questions, to be completed in 64 minutes, and 44 Math questions, to be completed in 70 minutes. Each section is scored on a scale of 800.
According to the College Board, which administers the test, Duy's score is in the top 1% of SAT scores worldwide . The average score of all 12th graders who have taken the test over the past three years is 1.175.
[Khuong Duy, 11th grade English major student, Lam Son High School for the Gifted, Thanh Hoa. Photo: Provided by the character
Having scored more than 1,500 points in the August exam last year, Duy was not too worried this time, setting a goal of 1,600. Comparing the results with his friends after the exam, seeing that he was only off by one question, he was confident that he would get a high score.
Khuong Duy admits that he is strong in Math, as long as he reads the test data carefully, he will definitely get it right. The test includes math knowledge from middle school, grade 10 and part of grade 11, it is not difficult for him to get full 800 points.
During the review period, the male student mainly searched for questions on open sources such as Khan Academy, College Board, Princeton, Cracksat... Every day, he took advantage of his breaks in class and evening study time at home to do at least two complete questions to get familiar with the format. If he got any questions wrong, he wrote down the detailed solution so as not to repeat them.
Last year, right before his first SAT test, Duy also achieved 8.0 in IELTS. Of which, Reading and Listening skills achieved perfect scores, Writing 7.5 and Speaking 6.5. Comparing the reading comprehension of the two tests, he believes that although the test formats are different, both require candidates to find important keywords to answer correctly.
Ms. Le Linh Huong, English teacher, homeroom teacher of English 11 class, Lam Son High School for the Gifted, is proud that her "talking and doing" student achieved high results in both exams.
"This is a worthy result for his determination and effort," she shared. She said Duy's strengths are in the Reading section thanks to his quick thinking and good vocabulary memory. In class, each time he takes a Reading test, if the time limit is 20 minutes, Duy only needs 10 minutes. The male student also often gets full marks in vocabulary tests.
"Last semester, she got a perfect score of 10 in English," said Ms. Huong.
Although he studied in an English major, Khuong Duy had a rough start with this subject. In primary school, Duy "couldn't learn" and often memorized the questions to cope with the tests. Seeing this, his parents sent him to extra classes with his close friends.
"I'm competitive by nature. Seeing my friends' high scores, I studied hard to surpass them. Like that, the more I studied, the more I liked English," Duy said.
Duy often watches movies with English subtitles, humorous English teaching videos by teacher Dan Hauer to increase his vocabulary and learn to speak with the intonation of foreigners. However, until now, the male student still admits that he is weak in speaking skills, sometimes his pronunciation and intonation are not natural. Duy spends his free time to improve this skill, mainly using Cambridge and Oxford dictionaries to correct his vocabulary pronunciation.
Duy considers English an important tool to help him explore and learn more knowledge, such as programming. He has learned Java script, HTML, C++... through technology websites such as w3schools, codeacademy. Last August, Duy was a member of the team that won the gold medal at AI-JAM, an international science and technology innovation competition, held annually in Silicon Valley, USA.
The male student said he will use his SAT and IELTS scores to apply to many universities, including Hanoi University of Science and Technology.
"My biggest wish is to be admitted to the Information Technology major of this school," Duy said.
Phuong Anh
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