About Shelby Joe

Shelby Joe 周 is the Founder of Piqosity. He has more than 20 years of experience in education as an entrepreneur, professor, and tutor. Shelby earned his BA in Political Science from Rice University. Born and raised in Mississippi, he now resides in Houston but has also lived in Beijing, Shanghai, and Hamburg.

Quick Start Guide to Improving Reading and Writing Skills

Piqosity's English Language Arts (ELA) courses help students improve their reading and writing skills and can be used for after-school enrichment and remediation or as a complete school curriculum substitute. This guide will show parents or educators how to get started with Piqosity's wealth of curriculum-aligned content. Compared to traditional strip-mall learning centers: Piqosity upgrades [...]

By |2026-03-16T14:54:03-05:00March 16th, 2026|English, ZPQA ELA 6, ZPQA ELA11, ZPQA ELA5, ZPQA ELA8|

Announcing Updates to ACT Enhanced Practice Tests

A little over six months have passed since the "Enhanced ACT" went live for all, would-be college students in September of 2025. Since then, we've collected feedback from the tens of thousands of students who have taken Piqosity's full-length practice ACT tests. Additionally, ACT has released two new, official practice tests. We've learned that [...]

By |2026-03-11T23:23:07-05:00March 11th, 2026|ACT Test Prep, ZPQA ACT, ZPQA Org Admin, ZPQA Teacher|

How Long Should You Study for the SAT?

Every student, parent, and school administrator always asks us, “how long does it take to improve an ACT or SAT score?” Asked to anyone else, the generic response that you’ll usually get for this admittedly broad question is “experts say about 10-20 hours.” But who are these experts and what does that mean? Can [...]

By |2026-02-19T07:31:09-06:00February 17th, 2026|SAT Test Prep|

How to Make Standardized Tests Less Scary | Managing Test-Taking Anxiety

If you find that the thought of an upcoming exam causes your hands to tremble, dries out your mouth, or makes you feel out of breath, you may be one of the millions of students who have test-taking anxiety. An upcoming exam can feel like a ghost hovering behind your shoulder, but managing the [...]

TSI Assessment Practice Tests (TSIA2), Free & Full-Length

Piqosity now offers 12 full-length TSI practice tests, and they're currently available for free! Of the 12 TSI tests, 6 exams are English Language Arts and Reading (ELAR), and 6 exams are mathematics. Like the actual Texas Success Initiative Assessment 2 (TSIA2), each ELAR and Mathematics test features an adaptive logic that automatically routes [...]

By |2026-01-13T19:59:23-06:00January 13th, 2026|TSIA2|

AI-Graded Student Essays Updated

Piqosity integrates with ChatGPT to AI-grade student essays. Essay prompts are found throughout Piqosity including in standardized test prep courses like TSI, ACT, and ISEE plus our English Language Arts (ELA) courses for grades 5-11. Upon writing their essay and scoring the quiz, students will now see an AI-generated score and specific feedback. As [...]

By |2026-01-13T10:29:40-06:00January 13th, 2026|Piqosity News, ZPQA Org Admin, ZPQA Org Teacher, ZPQA Teacher|

How to Use This TSIA Prep Course

Here are some tips to prepare for the TSI Assessment 2 (TSIA2) using Piqosity's resources. Piqosity is an edtech company based in central Houston, which we think makes us uniquely positioned to help you ace your TSIA2. Whether you're preparing for the TSIA2, the ACT, SAT, or any standardized test, our general advice is [...]

By |2026-01-13T10:23:29-06:00January 13th, 2026|App Alerts, ZPQA TSIA|

How Long Should You Study for the ACT Test?

Every student, parent, and school administrator always asks, “How long does it take to improve an ACT or SAT score?” Asked to anyone else, the generic response that you’ll often get for this admittedly broad question is “experts say about 10-20 hours.” But who are these experts and what does that mean? Can every [...]

By |2026-02-19T04:01:24-06:00January 12th, 2026|ACT Test Prep|

How to Improve Reading Comprehension Skills for Standardized Tests Like ACT and SAT

English teachers will often tell you that the only way to improve your reading comprehension skills is to simply read more. While sound and well-intentioned, this advice probably isn’t very helpful if you must quickly improve your skills, for example earning a higher score on a standardized test like the ISEE, ACT or SAT. [...]

By |2025-12-29T14:25:27-06:00December 29th, 2025|ACT Test Prep, English, SAT Test Prep|
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