Hey everyone! Did anyone ever take this test and is willing to share some information on it? If so, is it too ambitious to study for this test which is only about 3 months away with no prior high school studies?

What I have so far
--Maybe about 150 kanji (In compounds, readings + english perfected)
--Many hours of Japanese listening (Mostly J-Pop and some variety shows), also living in --Japan currently. It's been a month and a half and I'm leaving in 5 days
--Hiragana + katakana = done
--Basic grammar (Currently working through Genki 1, I'm on lesson 5 so far but I know some grammar ahead of lesson 5)
--I don't know maybe around 300-500 words?

I have about 5-8 hours of studying a day here in Japan (Active), and about like 15+ plus of passive if thats what you call it (Hearing Japanese and seeing it pretty much everywhere)
By seeing it I mean like seeing the kanji that I actually studied engraving it into my head.

When I get back to the states school will start again, and my temptation of playing video games will start again. That means maybe 2-3 hours of studying a day. HOWEVER my temptation of playing video games will be done with Japanese video games this time. (Kingdom hearts and Final fantasy) - These are pretty popular RPG games so yeah, challenging. <--- I will probably play this a log O-O

Anyway is it possible for me to get maybe a pretty good score on this SAT, I don't know what a decent score is, maybe 600? I just don't want to be placed in some introductory course when I get to college.

I'm also very interested in taking the JLPT, if possible is there any estimate on SAT --> JLPT level? I'm sure it's fairly low.

Sigh sorry for the long post but here's a little more information. Japanese will be my minor so I'll be studying it pretty intensively in college. Planning to go study abroad if my major allows it on my third year (Biomedical Engineering), than OK here's the big one, go to a graduate school in Japan. I was wondering if I study my *** off, would it be possible for me to hit N1 in pretty much 5 years. Than yeah even more ambitious, try to get a job in Japan in the engineering field, ideally a full japanese environment. But I wouldn't be mad if it was a international company..

Sorry for the long post! Thanks

To take an example test and find out
Read ajatt
And there are people who passed n1 who cannot speak japanese so it doesn't mean anything in terms of fluency

I just looked at a few sample questions. I'd guess that if you're around N4 level you could do well on this test. Some questions are easy enough that they'd be on N5.

It's certainly easier than N3, which is the easiest JLPT that I'm really familiar with--I've taken N2 and N1 so I know them, but N3 I also know fairly well from helping friends study. I'm guessing a bit about what's on N4 and N5.

Before doing all this studying, I would make sure that the colleges you are interested in even use the SAT II test for placement (and if they do, what score you would need). I've heard of using the AP test for placement, but not SAT II tests.

Either way, if you enjoy Japanese, studying Japanese sounds like it would still be useful for you, but, if the test isn't going to help, you'd be better off with regular studying instead of going hardcore.

So forget about taking the SAT II? How about just taking the AP on May self study? Anyone know the difficulty of that :p

I wouldn't necessarily say forget about taking the SAT II. If you would get credit for it at a college you are applying to, it could be useful. It would also be good to take it if you need an SAT II test and you would feel more comfortable with Japanese than any of the other tests (and you think you could do well).

All I'm saying is, don't assume you will get college credit for it. Even AP tests don't necessarily count for college credit. At my college, one of the only APs that counted was Biology and BC Calculus, and I think now even AP biology isn't counted. It all depends on the college.

It's still good to take advanced classes though. You will be better prepared for college and you will be more likely to be accepted to a college if you take AP classes and do well in them.

So, I recommend going to the websites for colleges that you are going to apply to, and checking out what criteria they use to place out of classes. If it isn't available on the website, try emailing or calling them.

Good luck!

The colleges I'm applying to gives me credit I get a 3 and above. I'm going for a 5 though if possible. Self study, was wondering if its possible in 8 months. Don't really know the difficulty.

Having taken both the AP Exam and the SAT II in terms of difficulty I would say it's like this:

N3 > AP Exam > N4 > SAT II

A 600 is a an average score for the SAT II Japanese and most of the SATIIs in general. It can be "difficult" in the sense that if you get one wrong your score automatically decreases by 40. You basically have to get everything right to ensure a good score because so many Japanese Natives take the test skewing the curve.

Despite what I said above the test is pretty easy. I got a 800 out 800 (or 780 it's been awhile) and my knowledge was probably ~400 Kanji and all the grammar that's on the Tae Kim guide.

AP Exam is pretty easy as well, I finished early and slept for a good portion of the exam. Should be easily manageable with ~600 Kanji known and all grammar on the Tae Kim guide. The AP board publishes a list of all the Kanji that could be on the test as well. The only real difficulty for someone self studying are the speaking and writing portions of the exam.