The Dojo.
Why the SAT counts again, how the belts work, and how Sensei Jay teaches.
Why the SAT matters more now.
MIT, Dartmouth, Harvard and Stanford require test scores again. Each said scores help predict how students do once they arrive.
The way Sensei Jay reads it, that's only half the story. AI now sits inside schoolwork. Grades have crept up for years, and an A means something different at every school. The SAT is the one test every applicant takes under the same rules.
- MIT
Reinstated its SAT or ACT requirement, announced by Dean Stu Schmill.1
- Dartmouth
Reinstated the requirement, announced by President Sian Leah Beilock, citing a study by Dartmouth faculty.2
- Harvard
Reinstated required testing, announced by Dean Hopi Hoekstra.3
- Cornell
Reinstated required testing from fall 2026 entry, after a multiyear study by its task force.4
- Stanford
Reinstated required testing on the advice of its faculty admissions committee.5
- Pew Research Center
54 percent of US teens have used AI chatbots for schoolwork (survey of September 25 to October 9, 2025).6
- ACT
The average high school GPA rose from 3.17 in 2010 to 3.36 in 2021.7
Your transcript says what your school says. The score says what you did on the day.
A Sensei, a Roadmap, and a belt for every set of moves you close.
Sensei Jay saw the SAT for what it is. It is a knowledge test, but also a game of moves. The same patterns come back every year, the way a martial art repeats its forms.
So he built Score Samurai to turn students into SAT Samurai Warriors. He became the Sensei and opened the Dojo. He hands out belts as each student closes the moves that used to cost them points. Each belt means a set of the test's moves no longer works on them.
White
Held from the Diagnostic. Every student starts here.
Green
Closes when the first set of moves on the Roadmap stops costing points across two practice tests.
Blue
Closes when the timed moves are closed and Desmos is a habit.
Brown
Closes when the hard-module moves in one section stop costing points.
Black
Closes when the hard-module moves in both sections stop costing points.
Nobody hands you Green. You take it.
The Samurai Way.
The test has moves. The SAT repeats the same moves every year. We teach the moves, not the subjects.
Your misses are the curriculum. The Roadmap is built from them, in the order they cost points. No syllabus, no two the same.
Points come back in order. The next hundred live in the most frequent misses at your score, never in the hardest topic.
Never react. Read. The test is built to make a student rush. A Warrior reads the tell first.
Earn the belt. Each one means a set of the test's moves no longer works on you.
Most prep teaches the subjects. The Dojo teaches the test's moves.
Built by Sensei Jay. Taught by Sensei Jay. Score Samurai takes on a limited number of students because every session is taught by him.
How Sensei Jay teaches.
I teach one move at a time, and I never rush it. I show the move once. Then the student does the solving while I watch for the habit that cost the points.
Every move gets a name, so it can be spotted before it fires. We finish when the student can say the rule in their own words. That is the only version I trust to hold up on test day.
Sensei Jay, The SAT Sensei
The Digital SAT is a pattern recognition game, not purely an intelligence test.
Built from 1,168 real SAT questions, catalogued one at a time.
The Dojo Roadmap is the plan. It is built from the student's own misses, not from a syllabus. It lists the moves to close, in the order they cost points at that score. It is rewritten as belts are earned. No two Roadmaps are the same.
You already know the material. You are losing points to habits that have names.
The same moves, every test. The wrong answers are built from the same handful of habits, year after year. A procedure stopped one step early. A first meaning trusted too fast. A true sentence that answers a question nobody asked. Once a student can name the move, it stops working.
The Desmos work. Desmos is built into the Math section. Half of the timing problem is knowing which questions to send to it. The rest is knowing which to work by hand. We decide that question by question, until the choice is a reflex.
Weekly tracking. Speed and accuracy are tracked every week, by section, and reported to the parent in the written note. Nobody has to ask how it is going.
Why students get stuck. No two students are stuck for the same reason. One loses points to the clock. Another picks the answer that is true and still wrong. A third knows the math cold and freezes when a question looks unfamiliar.
The way I see it, AI can answer the question. It cannot see why this student keeps missing it. That is the difference between an app and a Sensei.
Sensei Jay, The SAT Sensei, founder of Score Samurai
Numbers from Session 1.
Every student has a score log from the first session. It holds the baseline practice score, the midpoint, the final, and the moves still costing points after every session. The student and the parent can read it any week.
| When | Score | Moves still costing points |
|---|---|---|
| Baseline, before Session 1 | 1140 (Math 560, Reading and Writing 580) | 8 on the Roadmap |
| Session 1 | No test this week | 8 |
| Session 2 | No test this week | 7 |
| Midpoint practice test | Logged the day it lands | Logged the day it lands |
| Final practice test | Logged the day it lands | Logged the day it lands |
When a family gives written permission, their real log goes here in place of the sample.
Scores, colleges and dates.
When do SAT scores come back?
About two weeks after the test.
For the 2026-27 dates, scores release 13 days after test day. The June sitting takes 16.
Source: College Board score release dates, satsuite.collegeboard.org, read October 9 2026.
Pick the sitting you want to be your last, then count back.
What is a good SAT score?
A good SAT score is one that sits inside the middle 50 percent at the schools on your list.
Nationally, a 1200 is the 81st percentile and a 1400 the 97th. Source: College Board, research.collegeboard.org, read October 12 2026. See where any score from 1000 to 1500 stands.
Good is whatever gets you into the schools on your list. For one student that's a 1200, and for another it's a 1450. The Diagnostic starts with your list and works back to the score each school expects. Then it finds the moves that get you there.
Do colleges require the SAT?
Yes. Ten of the most selective schools require the SAT or ACT now, and more join every year.
Required now: Brown (from the 2024-25 cycle), Caltech (fall 2027 applicants) and Cornell (fall 2026 entry). Also Dartmouth and Harvard (both Class of 2029 on), and Johns Hopkins (fall 2026 entry). Plus MIT, Penn (fall 2026 applicants), Stanford (fall 2025 applicants on) and Yale.
Required later: Columbia and Princeton from fall 2028 entry, Notre Dame from fall 2028 entry, Vanderbilt from fall 2029 entry. Each stays test-optional until then. Every date is from the school's own admissions page, read October 9 2026.
The SAT is the one test every applicant takes under the same rules.
Many other schools stay test-optional. A strong score still helps there, and policies change, so check each school's own page.
| School | Reading and Writing | Math |
|---|---|---|
| Brown | 740 to 780 | 770 to 800 |
| Columbia | 740 to 780 | 770 to 800 |
| Cornell | 730 to 770 | 770 to 800 |
| Dartmouth | 740 to 780 | 760 to 790 |
| Harvard | 740 to 780 | 770 to 800 |
| MIT | 740 to 780 | 780 to 800 |
| Penn | 740 to 770 | 770 to 800 |
| Princeton | 740 to 780 | 770 to 800 |
| Stanford | 740 to 780 | 770 to 800 |
| Yale | 730 to 780 | 740 to 790 |
Source: federal IPEDS data for fall 2024 (a provisional release, the newest out), via College Navigator. These ranges count only students who sent scores. Use them as a guide, not a promise.
The Trap Map.
Five traps, a ten-question check and a page for parents on reading a score report. Free, in your inbox within a minute.
No spam. Unsubscribe any time.
Find the moves that cost you points.
Eight questions, about six minutes, and your results come up right away.
Start with the free Dojo Diagnostic.
One short form. Free and written. Back within one business day.