Every spring, juniors of Missouri high schools get to take the ACT for no cost. The ACT is a standardized test that is commonly used for college applications. The test is comprehensive over the main academic topics that have been learned throughout school.

“I think it helps them to see how the classes they’ve taken from ninth grade through eleventh grade culminates and summarizes everything that they’ve been offered through their years in school,” ACT Prep teacher Lea Hickerson said.

The test in the spring is for all juniors no matter their academic background.

“It helps student by providing the opportunity to take the test for free so that even though we have a waiver program for students that are on free or reduced lunch, they can take it twice each year for free. Not everybody takes advantage of that because some students feel like they won’t do well on it or are not well enough prepared. This says everybody takes it and then a lot of students realize it’s not as bad as they thought,” RHS counselor Sarah Kaelin said.

The test has many benefits for students.

“One, it gives some students an ACT score that would be afraid to take it before that would think maybe they weren’t going to do well on it, and then they see it and realize, ‘hey I can do well’. It’s also a score so that way we have a standard score for every student,” Assistant Principal Josh Smith said.