is a 29 ACT good?
hi i just got my ACT results back and i got a 29, i got a perfect score on reading and a 24 on math i think. should i take it again? it’s my first time taking the test and i’m a high school junior, i just would rather not go through the whole studying process and stress again. thank you for any advice!
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2 answers
29 represents a 90th percentile score so you did better than 90/100 people taking the ACT. Your reading was a 100th percentile score while your Math was only a 74th Percentile score.
Right now your individual scores really don't accurately represent your potential.
Obviously you are better at reading and English vs Math and Science. I would take a break and study up on Math and Science and tweak your English. If you got a 36, 34, 33, 33 you'd end up with a 34 composite which would good enough to submit to any college.
The big problem these days is since 99% of colleges are test optional so, this creates an artificially higher 50% percentile band because only those with good test scores are submitting. Therefore all schools are reporting higher test scores for their incoming class.
So even schools like Northeastern, Tulane, BU, BC, and GTech etc have the same ACT band as all the Ivy League these days. In prior Test Required years, the Ivys and Elite had higher ACT scores, not any more. I think for some schools like Rice, CMU, their ACT bands are higher than some of the Ivys.
Therefore your 29 ACT is a good score. You would fare well at schools like Ohio State, Baylor, Purdue, IU, Penn State, Santa Clara, Wisconsin-Madison, Pepperdine.
Hope this is useful. Good luck.
Hello,
I think you need to think about what your goals are overall. If you want higher aim for higher. The nice thing about the ACT is that a lot of colleges are super scoring your ACT tests. Due to this I would recommend taking the ACT at least one more time and focus on everything else(English, Math, Science) besides Reading. What super scoring will do is take the highest score from each category across all of your attempts and then use those to create your composite. This allows you to maybe focus on one specific topic that you wish to increase rather than everything else. This is what I have done with my ACT.
Also if you have studied before don't think you have to start from 0 again. Focus on the topics you missed most.
I hope this helps.
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Thank you so much for your input!