Slicing ACT scores three ways

1.  To be counted as college-and-career-ready by the Kentucky Department of Education, high school students will need ACT scores of 18 in English, 19 in mathematics, and 20 in reading.   Those are the scores that will count under the state's new accountability rules that will be applied to scores for 2011-12.   The new Kentucky Board of Education regulation on that is not yet final, but it's far enough along to treat those rules as about to be come official.

1a.  To avoid developmental courses,  students need those same scores when they enroll in public community colleges or universities.   With those scores, they can start their college career taking classes that can earn credits toward graduation, saving time, money and work on the way to their degree.  For Kentucky public higher education, those scores the "systemwide standard" set in Council for Postsecondary Education regulation.

2.  To be admitted to some colleges and universities, students will need higher scores than that. For example, University of Kentucky and the University of Louisville expect higher performance.  Students should check the websites of schools they may want to attend.

3.  To meet college-readiness benchmarks identified by ACT, Inc., students need an 18 in English, a 22 in mathematics, a 21 in reading, and a 24 in science.  Those results show scores that give students a 75% chance of earning a C and a 50% chance of a B in selected entry-level college courses, based on combining results from a variety of schools.

Special thanks to my colleague, Robyn Oatley, for alerting me to confusion about these different uses of ACT results.  Robyn's great work for ReadyKentucky is starting lots of important conversations!