kz26

I took the ACT last year and got a 35...yeah anyone would say that's pretty good. Took it for the last time this September and got a straight 36, in all sections. Obviously with a 36 you can say you got a perfect score...but in reality a 33/34+ is already at 99+ percentile. How would an admissions officer look at a 36 vs a still-good-but-not-perfect score? Obviously test scores aren't everything, but I'm kinda wondering...

whitesox24

Most people would probably say that a 34/35 vs. a 36 would not really matter. However, I think that a 36 really does help in college admissions. For example, Brown accepted about half of all applicants with a 36, while only accepting about 20 percent of applicants who got a 33-35. This tells me that colleges do care about a 36, as that is a big jump in acceptance rate for just a few more points on the ACT. Hope this helps.

whitesox24

Here's the source for the Brown Statistics I mentioned:

Brown Admission: Facts & Figures

Jman2306

It's really just correlation. Most people with 36s or 2400s have amazing extracurriculars and such to back their scores up. They don't get accepted because they have 36s, though it helps.

jchang14

i agree with jman.

just because they accepted half of those with a 36 doesn't mean they accepted them because they have a 36. the applicants who scored a 36 probably just had a perfect gpa, and great extracurriculars.

whitesox24

You can't tell me though that the people with 34/35s have much worse extracurriculars and GPA's and such than the people with 36s. The people with the 36s just did a little better on one test.

RahoulVA

Colleges want to have a lot of people with 36s when they publish their annual reports. Imagine how good a university would be if it had 300 people with 36s on the ACT(when only 428 got a 36 last year). But yeah those with a 36 are smart and know what they're doing in school if they did that good(almost perfect) because that's what the ACT is based on, your classes.