SAT Math: Median and Mode
26+ practice questions in Praczo
The concept, explained
- 1
Median: the middle value when data is arranged in order. For an even count of values, average the two middle values.
- 2
Mode: the value that appears most frequently. A dataset can have no mode, one mode, or multiple modes.
- 3
To find the median, always sort the data first — never skip this step.
- 4
Adding or removing a value near the middle of the data can change the median; a value far from the center usually does not.
- 5
The SAT often contrasts median with mean to test which is a better measure of center for skewed data.
- ✗ Forgetting to sort the data before finding the median and just picking the middle index of unsorted values.
- ✗ Assuming the mode is always meaningful — if all values appear once, there is no mode.
SAT-style practice
For the data set {3, 7, 7, 9, 12, 15, 15, 15, 20}, what is the median?
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