COMPASS placement test?

Discussion in 'General Distance Learning Discussions' started by lakipil, Feb 21, 2009.

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  1. lakipil

    lakipil New Member

    Hi everyone,

    I'm about to go to for an online school it's called - Utah Valley University. I'm a Professional Pilot, and they gave me a lots of credits for all my licenses / certificates.

    But, I have to take the Compass Placement test to start. Do you know any good test prep for Compass test, payware or freeware, a study guide? I search on Google and a lot of things showed up.
    Just afraid of some scam out there.

    any good info out there?
     
  2. Shawn Ambrose

    Shawn Ambrose New Member

    The Compass Assessment is simply an assessment for placement purposes. Depending on the "default setting" for the math - you will be asked questions on basic arithmetic, basic, intermediate, and college algebra, trigonometry, and calculus. As you get answers correct, the difficulty increases. As you miss answers, the difficulty decreases. Once you are at a baseline, then you will get score which reflects your ability level.

    The English Composition assessment works on a similar level.

    What you should review depends on your background - but don't sweat this too much.

    Shawn
     
  3. Marvin1

    Marvin1 New Member

    I just took it. Like Capella said it's basically a placement test. If you have moderate reading and writing skills you should be fine there. Just take your time on the reading. The toughest is probably the math just because it's the quickest to go when you've been out of school. If you don't feel comfortable with College Algebra you could maybe brush up on that.

    Also, the writng portion consists of the test presenting you with two solutions to a problem. You have to pick one of the solutions and make a case for it. 300-600 words
     
  4. cookderosa

    cookderosa Resident Chef

    It's true, you can't fail this test.....but.

    If you test in at your college's idea of low (under score of x) then you add serious cost and time to your plan. Here are 2 examples using hypothetical course numbers, you can look up your own school's numbers:

    degree requirement: MATH125 (pre-req MATH101 or compass placement of 50 of higher)

    You score 45, now you must complete MATH101 before enrolling in the math that counts for your degree. MATH101 in this example is "required" but doesn't "count."

    You have to carefully look at your college's prereq requirements for degree requirements. Sometimes it can add a full year just to walk into the class you need! A compass test can fast froward you through some (not all) prerequisite lines.
     
  5. Retail Slave

    Retail Slave New Member

    I think the only viable ones are available for purchase .
     
  6. ProfTim

    ProfTim Member

    Definately spend some time to brush up on your math skills (basic algebra and word problems). We have lots of students who score low on the math portion and are required to take a remedial math course that doesn't count toward their degree program. We have some students who perform poorly on the English component but the percentage of those students is very small compared to math.
     
  7. Shawn Ambrose

    Shawn Ambrose New Member

    I agree with ProfTim - We have far more remediation in math than in English due to Compass. Take the time to brush up.

    Can you remember the last math course you enrolled in? You could get a 1 month free trial of ALEKS and use the time to take a course.

    Shawn
     
  8. lakipil

    lakipil New Member

    Thank you all for your answers.

    I think I'll be allright with the math, but I'll need some brush up on English, I guess because I'm from Europe.

    Any recommendations on some good English prep materials for Compass?
     
  9. Shawn Ambrose

    Shawn Ambrose New Member

  10. johann24

    johann24 New Member

    Thanks for sharing! I had no idea there were sample questions for the COMPASS.

    I recently took it to gauge where I am after doing some hardcore math review, in preparation for the college algebra CLEP test. Today I took the COMPASS math today, but unfortunately ran out of time and won't be able to resume the test until the first week of January!

    I'll probably take more time to study, even though it's a bummer. Although I think I was doing good, because my last question was asking me about angles, must have been the geometry/trig part?

    Though a couple questions confused me. Particularly square root(18) x square root (2) and another one where I was supposed to distribute a factor with the square root of 3. Lots of square roots, factoring, etc. I'm not sure if these problems fall into the category of intermediate algebra or what?

    (2 + square root 3) (3 - Square root of 3)

    I hope it's okay to post this here?
     

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