CSAT D-100, Admissions Industry: "Tough CSAT Again This Year? Prepare for Question Changes"

"Need to Prepare for High Discrimination Items"
From Specific Items to Broad Items
Difficulty High After 'Excluding Killer Items'
"Must Avoid Turmoil Over Medical School Expansion"

With the 2025 College Scholastic Ability Test (CSAT) just 100 days away, the admissions industry predicts that highly discriminative questions will be featured again this year. In particular, there is advice that students need to prepare for a shift toward a broader range of difficult questions.

According to the admissions industry on the 6th, 100 days before the CSAT, since the policy to exclude killer questions was announced last June, the September mock exam, the actual CSAT, and this year's June mock exam all featured highly discriminative questions, leading to expectations that this year’s CSAT will also be of high difficulty.

After the announcement of the admission guidelines reflecting the increase in medical school quotas for the 2025 academic year, repeat students are taking the mock CSAT on the 4th at the Jongno Academy Mokdong main branch in Yangcheon-gu, Seoul. Photo by Jinhyung Kang aymsdream@

Lim Seong-ho, CEO of Jongro Academy, stated, "Although killer questions have been excluded, it is expected that the 2025 CSAT will feature highly discriminative questions in Korean, Mathematics, and English." He added, "Previously, highly discriminative questions were identified as killer questions, but now they appear in a much broader pattern." He further advised, "Students need to prepare for changes resulting from the emergence of highly discriminative questions following the exclusion of killer questions."

According to Jongro Academy’s analysis, in the Korean section, after the announcement to exclude killer questions, the September mock exam had a standard score of 142, the actual CSAT scored 150, and this year’s June mock exam scored 148, indicating very high discrimination. Mathematics also showed an upward trend with scores of 144 in last September’s mock exam, 148 in the actual CSAT, and 152 in this year’s June mock exam. The standard score represents how far a student's score deviates from the average when the raw score average is set to 100; the more difficult the exam, the lower the raw score average, resulting in a higher maximum standard score.

In English, which is graded on an absolute scale, the percentage of students achieving the top grade was extremely low: 4.37% in last September, 4.71% in the actual CSAT, and 1.47% in this year’s June mock exam. This is analyzed as a very high level of difficulty compared to 7.6% in last June’s mock exam.

Kim Won-jung, head of admissions strategy at Daesung Academy, said, "The June mock exam was similar in difficulty to last year’s CSAT for Korean and Mathematics, but English was more difficult." He advised, "For the actual CSAT, students should prepare expecting English to be easier than in the June mock exam." However, he added, "Since the policy to exclude killer questions is still in place, students should focus on past questions from last September’s mock exam onward to understand trends and difficulty levels."

Given the high difficulty of the June mock exam, there is also a forecast that the September mock exam, the last mock exam before the CSAT conducted by the Korea Institute for Curriculum and Evaluation, will be easier. Lee Man-gi, director of Uway Education Evaluation Research Institute, said, "The upcoming September mock exam is expected to be generally easy." However, he cautioned, "If that happens, the actual CSAT might be more discriminative in compensation, so students should not study based on premature assumptions." He also emphasized, "From now on, students should thoroughly study the inquiry subjects based on EBS textbooks and lectures."

Experts unanimously stressed the importance of pacing for students. Nam Yoon-gon, head of admissions strategy research at Megastudy Education, said, "Issues such as non-major selection, increased medical school admissions, and the abolition of designated natural science subjects may somewhat disrupt students’ concentration." Kim Byung-jin, director of Etoos Education Evaluation Research Institute, also urged, "The most important thing during these 100 days is to have a timetable that fits each individual’s situation."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.