June mock college entrance exam concludes; how to prepare for future admissions

With the June college entrance exam mock test now complete, the focus shifts to how students should prepare for the upcoming university admissions season. Experts are urging students to view the mock test results not as a cause for despair or elation, but as a crucial stepping stone for improving their performance on the main College Scholastic Ability Test (CSAT).

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This June mock test is evaluated as a test that has eased the burden of Korean and English compared to last year's CSAT while maintaining an appropriate level of discrimination.

Industry analysts generally assessed the June mock test as somewhat easier than last year's CSAT, particularly in Korean language and English. Woo Yeon-cheol, head of the Jinaksa College Admissions Research Institute, noted that the Korean section reinforced the importance of studying EBS textbooks and past questions. He observed that the math section aimed to evaluate problem-solving skills beyond simple calculations through changes in question phrasing and arrangement. English, he added, maintained the evaluation board's recent trend by demanding precise reading comprehension rather than focusing on difficult vocabulary or sentence structures.

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Students should not fall into hope or despair based on the results of this mock test, but rather use it as a stepping stone to improve their CSAT scores.

Kim Byung-jin, head of the Leetos Education Evaluation Research Institute, advised students against becoming overly emotional about their scores. He stressed the importance of analyzing mistakes, especially those that should have been correct, and identifying areas needing further study. Kim also warned that making hasty decisions about early admissions (susi) based solely on the June mock test results is inadvisable, as these decisions should also consider the potential for regular admissions (jeongsi).

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It is not advisable to make hasty decisions about early admissions based on the June mock test results.

Some experts predict that the English section's difficulty could be unpredictable, similar to last year's CSAT, which was criticized for inconsistent difficulty levels. The rate of students achieving the top English grade (first grade) varied significantly, from 19.1% in the June 2023 mock test to 4.5% in September and 3.1% in the actual CSAT. Lim Seong-ho, CEO of Jongro Hagwon, anticipates the English difficulty for this year's CSAT to be around 3.5%, similar to last year's exam, and advises students to familiarize themselves with changing question patterns by studying past CSAT English questions. Additionally, the upcoming CSAT will be the last under the current curriculum, and the first year of the regional medical school system, factors that could influence the number of repeat test-takers (N-su-saeng) and make score predictions more challenging.

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This year's CSAT English difficulty is expected to be very irregular, so rather than making hasty judgments about the difficulty, you should become accustomed to changes in the question patterns by studying CSAT past questions.