ACT is a nonprofit organization whose mission is to help people achieve education and workplace success. To help fulfill that mission, ACT offers school-day testing programs that provide all students with state- or district-funded access to its college readiness and admissions assessment, removing barriers to testing and opening doors to…

This study gathered, analyzed, and compared perspectives of students who were honors-eligible but never began the program, students who began in honors and discontinued their enrollment, and those who were persisting in honors. Broadly speaking (and not surprisingly), the responses of students persisting in honors reflected the most positive…

ACT has been measuring college readiness trends for several years. "The Condition of College & Career Readiness" is ACT's annual report on the progress of the graduating class relative to college readiness. This year, 54.3% of the graduating class took the ACT® college readiness assessment. This report is designed to help inform the…

This paper considers the problem of validating placement procedures or, more precisely, of determining their educational appropriateness. At issue is determining whether a test score serves the particular educational function it was designed to serve (for example, course placement), and whether it does so in an economical way. These determinations…

Differences in critical thinking between undergraduate and graduate students in the social and mathematical sciences was investigated using multiple measures of critical thinking that reflect different types of problem structure. Educational level and academic area differences were found across measures. (Author/MLW)

This study examined the separate and joint use of high school course grades, course work taken, and American College Testing Program (ACT) Assessment subject area scores for making course placement decisions. The data for this study were obtained from nine institutions through their participation in a pilot study of the ACT Course Placement…

The components of academic advising and the educational benefits to students are outlined and ways in which the American College Testing (ACT) Assessment Program can help are examined. The ACT Assessment Program is designed for use by students planning to enter postsecondary education and provides a base of information about freshman advisees. The…

This study used a logistic probability model to investigate the effects of variables relating student characteristics and institutional factors on the decision to apply to a large land-grant research university. The study used the entire data set from American College Testing (ACT) program test-takers in the fall of 1995 and institutional data on…