Why The Test Preparation Industry May Finally Get Out Of The Classroom

Focusing on SATs, LSATs or even the bar test seems unthinkable today as the world grapples with a global pandemic. Yet students are continuing to prepare in spite of the myriad other challenges they face during this crisis.

The choices these students are making now will drastically change the future of the test preparation industry. That's a market predicted to reach more than $30 billion by 2021 while posting an expected 6% compound annual growth rate (CAGR) through 2024.

As a test preparation company CEO, I'm making a bold prediction for my industry: Test preparation will never return to physical classrooms. I believe the current pandemic will finally erase all significant demand for classroom-based test prep. Here's why.

Everything Is Changing, But Test Prep Will Change More

As I argued in my latest Forbes article, the current, forced transition to distance learning will reveal many lasting benefits of remote education and reshape how they teach. For test preparation, however, I expect an even more drastic change. Classroom courses have irreplaceable benefits for students in some programs of study (e.g., the physical sciences). The value of any test preparation course, however, is dependent largely on just two factors: instructor quality and curriculum quality.

Online Test Prep Means More Consistent Instruction

Instructor consistency has long been a weakness of the test preparation industry. In 2008, before online prep was common, college admissions expert Richard Montauk wrote: "The major (LSAT prep) companies inevitably (given the huge numbers they employ) take on many instructors of less than stellar intellect…provide them with limited training and suffer from high instructor turnover."

If you don't have classrooms, you don't have to hire subpar instructors to fill a classroom in a market where no top-notch candidates are available. While instructors whose test scores were as low as the 90th percentile or even below may be hired to teach classroom-based LSAT courses, online-first companies can afford to restrict hiring to 99th-percentile scorers (that's especially important for the LSAT, where many top law schools' lowest-scoring admittees reached the 97th percentile).

A High-Quality Curriculum Works Anywhere

As for curriculum quality, standardized tests are a known entity. The most drastic changes to the SAT in years had less to do with the test than with attempts to correct for intrinsic biases in testing. The LSAT may be doing away with logic games, but analytical reasoning will remain, albeit in a different form.

The challenge, therefore, in creating an effective curriculum is twofold: First, you need to create a simple method that leads learners to correct answers, and second, you need to deliver course content in such a way that learners are able to acquire that knowledge.

The research says, and has said for years, that online learning is as good as classroom learning and sometimes even better for knowledge acquisition. So, any high-quality test preparation curriculum should serve students as well or even better online vs. in-person.

Market Manipulation Helped To Keep Classroom Test Preparation Afloat

If remote test preparation is as good or better than classroom-based prep, why hasn't this transition already occurred? The answer may be that large companies don't want change. Take, for example, the massive 2007 class-action lawsuit accusing two dominant companies of illegally creating a monopoly to drive out smaller, higher-tech competitors.

If the biggest players in any market collude to keep it from changing, change will be delayed until external factors intervene. Enter coronavirus. Industry giants will now have to scramble to catch up with online-first companies.

The Other Side Of The Coin

This industry shift carries with it a call to action for test prep companies to better serve their most economically vulnerable students. The New York Times found that absences increased more for poorer students following the forced transition to distance learning. Students of lower socioeconomic status own less reliable devices and lack access to broadband internet.

If we, as an industry, shift away from the classroom and onto the internet completely, they must address these socioeconomic disparities. Otherwise, test prep will become exactly what critics claim it is: just another way for wealthy students to get an unearned leg up. Some suggestions for my peers in the test preparation industry:

• Don't just offer scholarships — make them automatic. For students who have qualified for need-based assistance, like LSAC's fee-waiver, don't make them apply all over again. Just verify they've already qualified and then grant a scholarship.

• Test your product offerings on low-cost devices. The Huawei P20 Lite, priced under $350, is among the world's most-used smart devices. If your course isn't usable on a cheap Android phone, it is inaccessible to much of the world.

• Make your course work without data. What if a student's data plan is disconnected for nonpayment? Can they still use your app effectively by downloading enough course content from a Wi-Fi connection at school or work to later prep at home?

• Provide free access to live instruction. It doesn't cost you much to offer office hours with top instructors via Zoom, but it can benefit your students enormously.

• But don't use 'live online' as a stopgap. "Live online" requires students to log in at set times and watch instructors deliver content in real time via a webinar. By forcing students to learn at the same pace and on set schedules with limited access, this "innovation" actually shares many of the inefficiencies that plague the in-class model. Instead of this half-baked live online format, take the time to thoughtfully balance self-paced learning with free, live instructor support.

Final Thoughts

These are unprecedented times. In many ways more important than any standardized test score, the world has already changed for good. Both in test prep and in business in general, they must learn to adapt to a dramatically altered landscape.

What are you doing to prepare yourself for change in your industry? If you'd like to chat about it, let's connect. Together, they are all stronger, even at a time when in-person togetherness is impossible.

Test Preparation Workshops

UTSA workshops are more than just content review. They demystify the test through a combination of technique training, error analysis, and feedback delivered by an approachable and available instructor. Whether you're aiming for graduate school, law school, or undergraduate admissions, they have the tools and expertise to guide you toward success.

Test Preparation Enters The Age Of Artificial Intelligence

SAT test preparation books sit on a shelf at a Barnes and Noble store in New York City. (Photo by ... [+] Mario Tama/Getty Images)

In the ever-evolving landscape of test preparation, a new player has sprouted on the scene – artificial intelligence.

At the forefront of this movement is a Korean start-up, Riiid, founded by YJ Jang, a graduate of the Haas School of Business at the University of California, Berkeley. Riiid has already made a name for itself in the Asian test-prep market for the TOEIC, a measure of English proficiency in the business world. Now, the company has set its sights on the American market with an SAT and ACT prep system called R.Test.

A.I. technology, with its mimicry of the networks of neurons in the human brain, has the potential to revolutionize the way educators approach their craft.

“R.Test makes it easy for students to solve practice problems, as well as read the explanations to help fill gaps in knowledge,” said Kelly Jung, a 9th grade student at Lighthouse International School in Korea who has tried the product. “The post-test analysis was the most helpful part of the test, as it helped highlight both my weaknesses and strengths, allowing me to streamline my studying moving forward."

This is not the first time the world has seen the integration of technology in the classroom. In the 1960s, the earliest forms of computer tutoring systems were developed, but their prohibitive cost and lack of widespread access limited their impact. Decades later, rule-based A.I. systems were implemented, but they failed to live up to their potential due to scalability issues and the high cost of programming extensive domain expertise.

YJ Jang at Riiid's offices in Seoul, Korea

It was at Berkeley where Jang was introduced to the game-changing potential of deep learning. This form of A.I. allows algorithms to learn on their own, drawing from vast amounts of data. Jang recognized the implications of this technology for education, and upon returning to Korea, he founded Riiid in 2014. The company's team of data scientists have developed A.I. algorithms that track student performance, predict scores and anticipate when students may disengage. Through the use of their popular test-prep app, Santa, Riiid has amassed one of the largest public education data sets in the world, known as EdNet.

However, the task of gathering enough data to make A.I. applicable to the broader field of education remains a challenge. For now, Riiid focuses on the lucrative test-prep market, where data is more readily available, easily collectable and has partnered with educational companies around the world to develop test-prep apps.

The company's success has attracted a substantial investment from SoftBank's Vision Fund II, bringing Riiid's funding to over $250 million. With the upcoming release of their A.I.-powered R.test platform for college entrance exams, Riiid has the potential to drastically change the way students prepare for their future.

While there is no shortage of SAT or ACT test-prep offerings, none assess students based on immediate data. Khan Academy’s SAT test prep, for example, connects to College Board, administrator of the SAT, and assesses student weaknesses based on their last test – usually the PSAT. But that data can be months old.

R.Test relies on live data collected as students use the system. With the R.Test, students can quickly get their predicted scores for the full test just answering 30 questions, and learn actionable insights that include weaknesses and even test habits.

R.Test is “very targeted to your current work,” noted Oscar Torres, a high school math teacher in Chicago who has tried Riiid’s system. “That's what I liked.”