How to decide whether your child should take ACT or new SAT

A revamped SAT makes its debut next month, adding a new wrinkle to the parenting dilemma of whether to sign up a teen for the ACT or the SAT.

In Georgia, 72,898 of students from the class of 2015 took the SAT. Georgia students do not have a history of doing well on the test. The state's overall mean SAT score last year was 1450, lagging the national mean score of 1490.

Eric Greenberg of Greenberg Education Group says the ACT and SAT play to slightly different strengths, noting, “Overall, the new SAT will focus a bit more on reading skills, while the ACT tends to focus a bit more on math and science.”