Economically Unnecessary: The ACT is unnecessary and a waste of time and money

Sitting down at my kitchen table, Macbook in front of me with my browser open to the Common App, I began looking through the requirements for my desired schools. As I kept looking into different schools, two words stuck out to me over and over again — test-optional. It made me realize how the ACT is unnecessary and a waste of time and money.

The ACT is a curriculum-based education and career planning tool for high school students, that assesses the mastery of college readiness standards, according to ACT.org. Yet, I couldn’t disagree more.

The ACT is a one-day test that’s somehow supposed to encapsulate a person’s entire academic ability. Meaning if you’re a bad test taker, good luck. It usually ranges from 3 to 4 hours long with occasional 10-minute breaks in between the English, math, reading and science sections. 

For people who struggle with short attention spans or who are just slow test takers in general, the fast-paced aspect of the test may be especially challenging. If this test result is supposed to determine nearly my whole future, I want the time to at least read each question.

The test compiles content that high school students should be familiar with, yet somehow I was left to blindly answer questions about trigonometry — a subject I didn’t learn until the end of junior year after I took the test. A short, timed test that covers four years of curriculum that we’re just supposed to remember is a recipe for disaster. Spoiler: you can’t remember everything you’ve learned throughout high school, it’s impossible.

Not to mention, the test does have high-level reading and math concepts, but the real key is learning how to answer the questions, not necessarily how to solve the problems. The test may give you four answers on the English portion that are all technically grammatically correct, but you have to apply your test “knowledge” and choose the most correct answer. At that point, I’d rather just take a normal English vocabulary test.

Even the superscore — the average of your best scores on each section of the ACT — can be an issue for ACT scores. Imagine you take the test and severely struggle with the math portion every single time. Your superscore will be affected and lower because of it. 

I spent two weekends my junior year taking the ACT and paying a fortune for tutoring throughout the summer learning various “tricks” — like heading straight to the questions before reading passages — and I still didn’t get the score I wanted. I crumbled under pressure from gazing at the clock constantly, as it ticked during the timed test. I failed by not reaching the score range I worked hard for all summer. 

Don’t get me wrong, scoring high on the ACT can help decrease tuition costs and increase scholarships at some schools. But the countless hours I spent with tutors and reading the “ACT Prep” books weren’t worth it. Especially when all the schools I’m applying to are test-optional. 

According to Common Wealth Beacon, more than 80 percent of colleges are test-optional, and many schools also offer merit scholarships and aid through GPAs and involvement in extracurricular activities. As the Shawnee Mission Education Foundation came to East to showcase student’s scholarship offers from colleges, I realized how easy it is to get money from colleges without a high ACT score.

As of 2020, most colleges, even prestigious ones like UPenn and Columbia, turned test-optional, allowing applicants the choice of submitting their ACT and/or SAT scores, according to Horizon Education. This has allowed students to shine in other aspects of their application, like their essay writing or involvement, if their test scores aren’t the strongest.

From my countless hours of studying, practice tests and spending my precious weekends taking the ACT, the test is unnecessary and a waste of time and money.