SHSAT Prep: Live Classes, Tutoring, & On-Demand Practice

Ready to Get Started?

  Give us a call at (917) 722-0677

The SHSAT (Specialized High Schools Admissions Test) is used by the New York City Specialized High Schools to determine admission into the school. Performance on the SHSAT is the sole factor used when determining admission to a New York City Specialized High School, which is why SHSAT prep is so important. Certain other schools in the country also use the SHSAT for admission. The SHSAT is broken down into two large sections – Verbal and Math. However, the verbal section is actually broken down into Revising/Editing and Reading Comprehension. Students take the SHSAT in the fall of 8th grade. If a student does not gain access to a specialized high school after the 8th grade test, the student can try one more time in the fall of 9th grade.

We offer three options for preparing for the SHSAT. Whether your child prefers 1-on-1 tutoring, a prep class, or self-paced online SHSAT prep, we are able to help.

Facts About the SHSAT

The SHSAT is used for Admission to the Following Schools in NYC

• Bronx High School of Science
• Brooklyn Latin School
• Brooklyn Technical High School
• High School of American Studies at Lehman College
• High School for Math, Science and Engineering at City College
• Queens High School for the Sciences at York College
• Staten Island Technical High School
• Stuyvesant High School

*Note that Fiorello H. Laguardia High School is also a specialized high school, but it does not use SHSAT for admission.

What is on the SHSAT?

The SHSAT is comprised of two parts: Part 1 – English Language Arts and Part 2 – Mathematics. The parts can be taken in any order; questions may be answered in any order.
The ELA (English Language Arts) part of the test tests students, abilities to revise and edit sentences, paragraphs and passages. The ELA part also includes reading comprehension questions.
The Mathematics part covers a wide-range of topics, including arithmetic, algebra, and geometry.

Format of the SHSAT

Sample Questions

How Should I Prepare for the SHSAT?

First Step: Practice Test

Assuming you already did your research and have decided that you want to attend a Specialized High School, the first step in preparing for the test should be to take a practice test with diagnostics that allow you to measure your strengths and weaknesses.

You can take a free practice SHSAT with diagnostics at our office, just call to schedule a day and time. You can also take a free SHSAT online on our website here: https://caddellprep.com/free-practice-tests/free-practice-shsat/

Next Steps

Your next steps depend on how much time you have until the test. If you have sufficient time, you should review all of the topics on the test. Just because you are good at a certain topic, doesn’t mean it should be overlooked. The questions on the test are tricky and may require you to apply knowledge of a topic in a way that you are not familiar with. Also, the test is timed, so it is important to be proficient enough to be able to answer the questions quickly.
If you are limited on time, a good strategy may be to focus on the part you are best at, ELA or Math, and try to ace it. If you are not clearly better at either section, focus on the topics that can have the biggest impact on your grade – the question topic with the most wrong answers.

Continuously Practice and Measure

While you are reviewing, take practice tests with diagnostics to see how you are improving. This will give you some insight into how to adjust your studying if necessary.

Scoring the SHSAT

The SHSAT is scored out of a possible 800 points, with the English section and math section scored separately out of 400 each. There isn’t a direct conversion from a raw score (number of correct questions) to the scaled score because the results are normalized.
In general, it has been shown to be better for a student to do really well on one section than to do average on both. The scoring is complex. A post dedicated to explaining how the SHSAT is scored is available here.

Other Advice

Getting into a specialized high school is a big deal. However, whether or not you get in will not define who you are and what you can achieve. It is possible to put so much pressure on yourself that you cannot focus during the test and constantly second-guess yourself. Realizing that the test won’t make or break who you are will allow you to think more clearly and excel.
The other way to reduce stress is to be prepared. If you prepare well for the test and have done well on the practice tests, you shouldn’t worry on test day.

What are the Specialized High Schools?

Here is the list of the eight specialized high schools that use the SHSAT for admission, along with some information to find out more about each.

• Stuyvesant High School
  345 Chambers Street, New York, NY 10282
  www.stuy.edu
  (212) 312-4800
• Staten Island Technical High School
  485 Clawson Street, Staten Island, NY 10306
  www.siths.org
  (718) 667-3222
• Brooklyn Technical High School
  29 Fort Greene Place, Brooklyn, NY 11217
  www.bths.edu
  (718) 804-6400
• Bronx High School of Science
  75 West 205th Street, Bronx, NY 10468
  www.bxscience.edu
  (718) 817-7700
• The Brooklyn Latin School
  223 Graham Avenue, Brooklyn, NY 11206
  www.brooklynlatin.org
  (718) 366-0154
• High School for Mathematics, Science and Engineering at the City College of New York
  240 Convent Avenue, New York, NY 10031
  www.hsmse.org
  (212) 281-6490
• High School of American Studies at Lehman College
  2925 Goulden Avenue, Bronx, NY 10468
  www.hsas-lehman.org
  (718) 329-2144
• Queens High School for the Sciences at York College
  94-50 159th Street, Jamaica, NY 11433
  www.qhss.org
  (718) 657-3181

Ready to Get Started?

  Give us a call at (917) 722-0677