I had been awarded a generous scholarship to attend the Phillips Exeter summer semester
— five weeks of classes and sports, with some optional SAT prep mixed in.
So I didn’t understand why so many of them were enrolled in the optional SAT prep section of our summer program.
How I Learned to Take the SAT Like a Rich Kid -
FLINT, Mich. — The summer before my junior year of high school, I boarded an airplane for the first time.
They were gunning for a score on the Preliminary SAT exams
that would put them in the top percentile of students in the United States and make them National Merit Scholars in the fall.
Family and friends from home thought it was weird that I went to “school” during my summers,
but the kids at Exeter saw summer academic programs as normal and enjoyable.
My newfound friends worked extremely hard, but they also seemed to have access to a formula for success that had been kept from the rest of us.
The bottom line is that students like me — from middle- to low-income families, who live in less
prosperous areas of the country — tend to stumble upon opportunities by luck (if at all).