This essay describes Louisiana State University's search for an alternative to available placement protocols. Under the leadership of Les Perelman at MIT, LSU collaborated with four universities to develop iMOAT, a program for administering online assessments of student writing. This essay focuses on LSU's On-line Challenge, which developed from…

Criticizes the game-playing of students who participate in Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) preparation courses, are tutored, and take the SAT again and again to render themselves eligible for the college of their choice. Advocates the matching of academically compatible students and colleges without this artificial score boosting. (KS)

There has been an increase on the number of applicants and the average SAT scores of the admitted students to colleges and universities in the United States. The total number of applicants may increase for purely external reasons, such as more students graduating from high school or more students reading good things about a particular college, but…

Two veteran high school counselors answer college bound students' common questions about selecting and applying to colleges. Topics discussed include where to begin research, criteria for selecting schools, number of applications to submit, parent role, getting counselors' help, relative importance of admission criteria, applying to parents' alma…