SSAT sample questions with answers, section by section

Our housing association in Malmö has 84 apartments and one laundry room, which is common in older Swedish blocks. For forty years we booked it by sliding a small numbered lock onto a wooden board beside the door. Three years ago the committee replaced the board with a booking app. At the next annual meeting I will move that we take the app away and hang the board back up. Before anyone smiles, I am thirty-one and I write software for a living.

You will hear it said that the old people cannot manage phones. That is false. Mrs. Lund, who is 88, books faster than I do. My complaint is arithmetic. In the board's last year, the room stood empty for about 6 of its 42 weekly slots. Last year it stood empty for 17. In the same year, the list of people waiting for an evening slot grew longer.

The reason is not mysterious. An app makes booking cost nothing. People now reserve every Sunday evening for months ahead, just in case, and they forget to cancel. The board was free too, but you had to walk down to the cellar, so you booked what you needed. And the board showed your number. If a slot under lock 31 went unused, someone on the stairs would mention it to number 31. The app shows only the word "unavailable."

The committee's answer is a fine of 50 kronor for every unused slot. This is a bad answer. It turns a matter between neighbors into a bill to be disputed, and the treasurer, who would have to collect it, has already said she will resign first.

The board had its faults. Locks were sometimes moved in the night, and in damp winters the wood swelled until they stuck. But those were troubles of a few days a year. Eleven wasted slots a week is a trouble of every week, and the remedy is hanging in the caretaker's storeroom, where I found it last month.

Our housing association in Malmö has 84 apartments and one laundry room, which is common in older Swedish blocks. For forty years we booked it by sliding a small numbered lock onto a wooden board beside the door. Three years ago the committee replaced the board with a booking app. At the next annual meeting I will move that we take the app away and hang the board back up. Before anyone smiles, I am thirty-one and I write software for a living.

You will hear it said that the old people cannot manage phones. That is false. Mrs. Lund, who is 88, books faster than I do. My complaint is arithmetic. In the board's last year, the room stood empty for about 6 of its 42 weekly slots. Last year it stood empty for 17. In the same year, the list of people waiting for an evening slot grew longer.

The reason is not mysterious. An app makes booking cost nothing. People now reserve every Sunday evening for months ahead, just in case, and they forget to cancel. The board was free too, but you had to walk down to the cellar, so you booked what you needed. And the board showed your number. If a slot under lock 31 went unused, someone on the stairs would mention it to number 31. The app shows only the word "unavailable."

The committee's answer is a fine of 50 kronor for every unused slot. This is a bad answer. It turns a matter between neighbors into a bill to be disputed, and the treasurer, who would have to collect it, has already said she will resign first.

The board had its faults. Locks were sometimes moved in the night, and in damp winters the wood swelled until they stuck. But those were troubles of a few days a year. Eleven wasted slots a week is a trouble of every week, and the remedy is hanging in the caretaker's storeroom, where I found it last month.

My grandfather, Pop, read water meters for the town for thirty years, and for the last ten of them his dog, Major, rode along in the truck. Now Pop has bad knees and Major has a gray face, so the summer I stayed with them, I was the one who walked the dog.

Major had his own idea of a walk. He refused the short way around the block. He dragged me up Ferris Street instead, stopping at number 14, number 22, number 31, and two houses near the top. At each one he sat at the gate, looked at the door, and waited. After a minute he went on. Pop had read every meter on Ferris, about forty houses.

I knew what I was seeing. This old dog was still doing the job, still making the rounds for the man he loved. It nearly made me cry. My summer reading teacher had asked for a true story, so I wrote one called "The Last Round." I read it to Pop on the porch, with feeling.

He listened with his coffee halfway to his mouth. Then he had to put the cup down, because he was laughing too hard to hold it. "Did you ever look at who lives at those houses?" he said. "Fourteen is Ruth Lund. She bakes. Twenty-two buys a ham every week of the year."

"That dog never cared about a meter in his life," Pop said, wiping his eyes. "I knocked on doors. He learned which doors had breakfast behind them."

I did not believe him, so the next morning I watched. At number 14 we waited a full minute. Then Mrs. Lund came out in her slippers with a corner of toast. Major took it gently and went on up the hill.

On Thursday I brought a corner of my own toast and gave it to him at the top of the hill, by the bench, where we had never once stopped. When I told Pop, he shook his head. "Now you've done it," he said. "That's a new one for his list."

My grandfather, Pop, read water meters for the town for thirty years, and for the last ten of them his dog, Major, rode along in the truck. Now Pop has bad knees and Major has a gray face, so the summer I stayed with them, I was the one who walked the dog.

Major had his own idea of a walk. He refused the short way around the block. He dragged me up Ferris Street instead, stopping at number 14, number 22, number 31, and two houses near the top. At each one he sat at the gate, looked at the door, and waited. After a minute he went on. Pop had read every meter on Ferris, about forty houses.

I knew what I was seeing. This old dog was still doing the job, still making the rounds for the man he loved. It nearly made me cry. My summer reading teacher had asked for a true story, so I wrote one called "The Last Round." I read it to Pop on the porch, with feeling.

He listened with his coffee halfway to his mouth. Then he had to put the cup down, because he was laughing too hard to hold it. "Did you ever look at who lives at those houses?" he said. "Fourteen is Ruth Lund. She bakes. Twenty-two buys a ham every week of the year."

"That dog never cared about a meter in his life," Pop said, wiping his eyes. "I knocked on doors. He learned which doors had breakfast behind them."

I did not believe him, so the next morning I watched. At number 14 we waited a full minute. Then Mrs. Lund came out in her slippers with a corner of toast. Major took it gently and went on up the hill.

On Thursday I brought a corner of my own toast and gave it to him at the top of the hill, by the bench, where we had never once stopped. When I told Pop, he shook his head. "Now you've done it," he said. "That's a new one for his list."