Wednesday, March 26, was standardized testing day for TGS students.  Students in grades 6-8 took the ACT: EXPLORE and students in grades 9 and 10 took the ACT: PLAN (students in grades 11 and 12 have taken the PSAT, the SAT or both).  Students spent the day alternating between testing and attending the Wonderful Wednesday workshop classes and labs. Head of School Dr. Gary Gates said, “The purpose of standardized testing in this our first year is to establish a baseline against which we can compare future scores for the purposes of evaluating our teaching and curriculum.  It is not the philosophy of TGS to ‘teach to’ any particular test or to place undue emphasis on standardized testing.” He added that the ACT: EXPLORE and ACT: PLAN are grade-based and nationally normed, plus they have new questions every year that measure students’ competence in Math, Science, English and Social Studies.

The news about the TGS students’ SAT scores in 2013-2014 is overwhelmingly good:  our juniors and seniors have scores that surpass 2013 local, state and national averages.  The average score for TGS is 1737 while Georgetown County averaged 1379, South Carolina averaged 1436 and the national average was 1498 (source: Sun News, Dec. 26, 2013).  Amazing job, TGS students!!