John looked at the clock while he searched his mind for something else to write on the true meaning of happiness. “This is a stupid topic,” he said to himself, “I wouldn’t even be going to college if I could play professional baseball.” At least he was done early, he thought, as he gathered the test booklet and his answer sheet. He confidently turned in his essay and when home. “Piece of cake,” he congratulated himself, “I’ll ace the SAT, make mom and dad proud and get a baseball scholarship so I can keep playing.”

But John was shocked when the results came back. He had only scored one out of six on the SAT essay. “What did I do wrong?” he asked in frustration, as he saw his college dreams vanishing. “I answered the question, my grammar was good and I filled the test page.”

Because John had no idea what the SAT graders were looking for, he wasted 25 very important minutes of his life. If John had only done a little preparation, the outcome of those 25 minutes might have been completely different. You don’t have to produce a piece of literature to do well on the new essay section of the SAT, but you do have to know how to make your writing strengths outshine your weaknesses.