Chicago Public Schools is replacing its current high school admissions test for eighth graders with a different exam that is more than twice as long and will be available only in English.
Starting in October, students will take the PreACT 9 Secure instead of the High School Admissions Test, or HSAT, according to an email sent to principals by Karime Asaf, CPS’ chief education officer. Many students spend time preparing for the test, and their scores determine whether they get into a selective-enrollment high school.
The current HSAT is offered in several languages, including Spanish and Arabic. Some parents worry the switch to an exam that’s only in English could worsen disparities in representation that already exist at selective schools.
Mary Carmen, the parent of two students at Saucedo STEAM Magnet Academy in Little Village, a community where many students and parents speak Spanish, wonders why CPS is making this shift when the district shares information with parents in many languages.
“I don’t see how that’s beneficial to any of us,” Carmen said. “It seems like we’re regressing.”
But Asaf said the district’s data showed that offering the HSAT in additional languages didn’t provide “any advantage” for students who are learning English, compared with taking the test in English with accommodations.
“In fact, students who completed the test in an alternate language performed lower than English Learners who took the test in English with accommodations,” Asaf wrote.
She added that one goal of the switch is to make the test more equitable. There wasn’t a lot of public information about the HSAT, which often meant students from wealthier families paid for private test prep, while students from low-income families struggled to prepare.
The new exam is “widely used,” Asaf wrote, so there are free practice tests and other low-cost prep materials. Students at thousands of schools across the country took the PreACT 8/9 tests during the 2025-26 school year, according to ACT, the company that makes the test.
Asaf cited several additional reasons for the change, including that the new test could provide additional information about student performance as they enter ninth grade, which can help with course placement and other programming decisions in high school.
Officials also have “greater confidence” in the technology and security of the PreACT’s platform, Asaf wrote. She noted that issues with the HSAT testing platform impacted several schools in recent years. Students had to take make-up tests and make other adjustments that frustrated families.
The other big shift is the length of the test. The current HSAT is an hour long, with 30 minutes each for reading and math. The new exam takes about two and a half hours to complete and includes four sections: reading, math, science and English language arts.
But Charlie Howard, the owner of Test Prep Chicago, a local tutoring company that helped 3,000 CPS students get ready for their exams last fall, said that doesn’t mean students will need twice the time to prepare.
The company recommends students begin preparing for the PreACT 9 about three months before the test, which is similar to their guidance for the HSAT. That means rising eighth graders can get ready for the switch over the summer.
“I don’t anticipate the amount of prep time to change wildly or to increase wildly,” Howard said. Though he added that the new math section may contain “slightly” more difficult concepts, so students struggling in math may need to start studying earlier.
And though some students and parents are worried about preparing for the new science section, Howard said it’s more akin to a reading comprehension test than an evaluation of the student’s knowledge of chemistry, biology or physics.
“It’s more students being able to read a passage on a scientific concept,” as well as interpreting charts and graphs, Howard said. “I think two or three months is plenty of time for students to be prepared for this exam.”
Though Carmen’s oldest child at Saucedo is only in fifth grade, she is among the CPS parents who begin prepping their children for the high school admissions test at a young age because it is highly competitive. Now, she has to start over. She wishes the district did a better job communicating the change ahead of time with parents. CPS students are slated to take the new test on Oct. 7, similar to the current testing schedule.
“They want to talk about parent and community engagement and you can’t have that if you’re making these decisions” without hearing from them, Carmen said.