American College Testing - ACT Test

The ACT test is a standardized achievement examination for college admissions in the United States produced by ACT, Inc. It was first administered in Fall 1959 as a competitor to the College Board's Scholastic Aptitude Test, now the SAT Reasoning Test. Some students who perform poorly on the SAT find that they perform better on the ACT and vice versa. In February 2005, an optional writing test was added to the ACT, mirroring changes to the SAT later that year. All four-year colleges and universities in the U.S. accept the ACT but different institutions place different emphasis on standardized tests such as the ACT, compared to other factors of evaluation such as class rank, G.P.A., and extracurricular activities.

ACT, Inc.

ACT, Inc. was originally known as the American College Testing Program, Inc. In 2002 the company was restructured to include "Education" and "Workforce Development" divisions, each overseen by its own advisory board. Each state also has its own state organization, and the entire company is overseen by a Board of Directors made up of 14 members.

Score percentiles

Of the graduating high school class of 2006, there were 1,206,455 students who took the ACT; this comprises 40% of the graduating class. The average composite score was a 21.1. Of these test-takers, 517,563 (or 42.9%) were males, 646,688 (or 53.6%) were females, and 42,204 (or 3.5%) did not report a gender. Nationwide, 216 students who reported that they would graduate in 2006 received the highest ACT composite score of 36.[11] Males on average scored one fifth (.2) of a point higher on the ACT than females. Only one out of about every 5,500 test takers will receive a perfect score (a 36). This is the 99.98 percentile.

This article contains information from Wikipedia.