ACT College Entrance Exams To Be Required For All Louisiana High School Juniors

Beginning next year, all high school juniors in Louisiana will be required to take the ACT -- for free.

A new effort by the Louisiana Department of Education will include administering a series of standardized pre-tests that prepare students for the ACT beginning in the eighth grade. The pre-exams, called EXPLORE and PLAN, will be administered once a year leading up to the junior-year ACt, and are designed to measure student progress in math, English, reading and science in preparation for the college entrance exam.

The first administration of the ACT for all juniors across the state will be subsidized by the state and will take place during school hours. Lower income students could later be eligible to take the exam a second time for free, according to the Daily Comet.

Roughly 75 percent of high school graduates in Louisiana currently take the ACT, and the state still has the smallest percentage of households in the country where at least one adult has an associate or bachelor's degree, according to The Advocate.

The new testing requirements are targeted at "changing that cycle," state Superintendent of Education John White told The Advocate.

"Kids want to be challenged, kids want to achieve," White said. "It is our obligation to raise the bar."

Requiring all students to take the ACT could force the average state score lower, but Terrebonne school Superintendent Philip Martin told the Daily Comet that many students could benefit from a required shot at the college entrance exam.

"I think you're going to see kids who say, 'Well, I didn't think of myself as college material, but this score is better than I thought it would be,'" Martin said. "And that could easily make them go in a direction they wouldn't have before."

The average ACT score among Louisiana test-takers rose marginally last year to 20.2 from 20.1 the previous year. The highest score is 36. State Commissioner of Higher Education Jim Purcell told The Times-Picayune last August that the rise can be attributed to the increased number of students taking more challenging courses that are designed to prepare them for college.

While the national average on the ACT rose slightly for the high school class of 2011, 28 percent failed to meet any benchmark that indicates they are ready for college, and likely needed remedial college work to catch up.

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Comments

[Tee Cajun]

10:51 PM on 06/02/2012

Another example of "Disaster Captitalism" exploiting the last frontier the "american public sector." The purpose of government is to provide the private sector with profit opportuinties. The citizens can eat cake.

[Patriot86]

05:51 AM on 04/30/2012

Why? Such tests are for college entrance and have no place in High School and are expensive...same thing going on in Ohio...who is getting paid off? Another way to target public schools...deliberately lower graduate rates and then claim schools are failing...and rush in with new Wall Street private schools for all...and in a few years...school becomes 'voluntary' while millions of new young peasants are rushed into an increasingly dangerous and low paid workforce.

[lcr999]

02:55 AM on 04/30/2012

http://www.act.org/newsroom/data/2011/states.html

Interesting how all the avarage scores in Dixie are so much lower than the average scores in the North East.

[amandanunez]

04:50 PM on 04/29/2012

I don't see anything wrong here at all. These tests are designed to fit the criteria of what your child was taught and should know. The questions range from simple to difficult. By taking these tests you find out just how ready you are for college (education wise) and what you should study up on. As long as your child/children attend school regularly and work hard (which all students should do) than they have nothing to worry about. Besides, the ACT is there to help them. They don't lose credits by not scoring well. Taking these tests is a privilege. Not to mention the fact that they are of no cost to you. God forbid our tax money be used for educational purposes. Lastly, why is testing special education students such a crime? Should a special needs student want to become a doctor than so be it. They need the proper schooling and training to do do. We shouldn't "take it easy" on them so to speak. Should that student become a doctor and go into open heart surgery but failed to take proper educational measures than what?

[Patriot86]

05:52 AM on 04/30/2012

Baloney, there should be two diplomas ...general and college bound...this is a way to make public schools look bad...not every kid will or should pass physics...we are not making schools better with this nonsense but make sure a fair number of students will fail..which is what the tests are designed to do.

[amandanunez]

02:06 PM on 04/30/2012

The test is not an equivalent to a high school diploma or college acceptance letter. You strive to pass it to prove what you've learned and what you remember. Why the hell would there be two diplomas? One for hard working students and one for slackers? No thanks.

[smileylib]

05:30 PM on 04/27/2012

Gee, welcome. You will become the fourth state in the country to require the ACT of ALL juniors. I'm currently a special educator in MI where all juniors have been required to take the test for years now, including special ed students, intentional non-learners, and kids who come to school once a week. Watch those scores drop and then your governor & state legislature can blame the teachers like they do here in MI. Good luck!

[blindjester]

03:32 PM on 04/28/2012

We just gave the ACT to all of our juniors (inner city).

Half of the students were in the auditorium for this.

The only time my smart son ever scored low on a test was when he took the PSAT in the auditorium, with 500 of his closest, sniffiest, squeakiest friends, with a white board on his lap to write on.

[OldSchool4942]

09:26 PM on 04/25/2012

Watch your scores fall as you test special ed kids (and I mean no offense) and kids that just don't care and are only in school because the law requires it.

[RanknFile]

09:08 PM on 04/25/2012

Yeah...mandate an exam that some colleges are moving away from. Nothing's for free...kids get it for free, the school's pay the price. Way to go testing companies! Profit$ over people. Worrd

[Bill Jones123]

09:00 PM on 04/25/2012

Get rid of high stakes testing and give these students a test that MEANS SOMETHING.

And then include it in their grade.

[Bill Jones123]

08:59 PM on 04/25/2012

Did ETS give Jindahl a big fat BONUS?

[OliviaBolivia27]

06:33 PM on 04/25/2012

Whoa whoa whoa, is the guy in the photo REALLY filling in those bubbles with skinny little X's, in PEN, no less? In my day, proctors spent the first ten minutes of every exam period demonstrating how to completely shade in the entire bubble, in #2 pencil, erasing any stray marks! What has happened to our education system?!

[shellelee09]

08:59 AM on 04/26/2012

That was the first thing I noticed in this article too!

[smileylib]

05:31 PM on 04/27/2012

LOL! Even our first graders know how to properly bubble a scan sheet! :)

[J R M]

04:48 PM on 04/25/2012

It may pick up a few students who may be viewed as "surprise scholars", students who had no idea that they were reasonably capable of college. I believe that Daniel Patrick Monyhann, who later became a senator, went off to college after taking such an exam. I believe he was working as a stevedore at the time.

I doubt that it is a very cost effective way of doing this.

My 14 year old daughter took the ACT in her sophomore year, 5 months ago. She got a 34. While her score was a bit of a surprise, I already knew she was college ready.

[blindjester]

03:36 PM on 04/28/2012

Wow!

Tell her congratulations from another teacher. Well done. (To her parents, too.)

Hope she finds something she loves to aim for. Too often smart kids get channeled without realizing....

[J R M]

01:38 AM on 04/30/2012

Thanks.

She got her admission letter from the University of Washington yesterday. She will be dropping out of high school and jumping to the honors program at the U of Wa, where she will start her Engineering studies. She should graduate with her Engineering degree when she is 19.

[tultican]

03:40 PM on 04/25/2012

Those "non-profit" and corporate testing houses are really raking in the big bucks now! Isn't education "reform" wonderful? How much lobbying money did this piece of legislation cost the ACT Corporation? Meanwhile, back in the K-12 classroom many of our class sizes are surpassing 40 students. All this money spent on testing looks wasted to me. Can you say boondoggle?

[jaclynb1983]

02:55 PM on 04/25/2012

Idaho juniors, starting this year, all had to take SAT or ACT. The state also paid almost $1 million for each junior to take the SAT.