Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Identification, Testing & Assessment ACT for seventh graders

Our experience was exactly opposite of that. Without scores we could have used dynamite and not been able to cross through the college admissions door with a preteen. With the scores - open sesame! So, I would encourage anyone who thinks college is needed for their child to go ahead and try the SAT or ACT. We had zero problems with registering for either. The ACT has allowed registration online. The SAT will send you a registration packet by mail. And, of course there is always the option of registering through talent search but it is more expensive and less flexible on dates.

As far as accommodations, I agree it is a process and you need to allow time for that process. That is true no matter your child's age. If your child has a medical condition where they can't be apart from you or a person who has been trained in medical procedures probably you aren't thinking about registering them for independent college experiences at this point. So, I would guess it probably isn't something to worry about right now.

<nodding> Exactly why I said that it wouldn't unlock anything for her personally at this point, since residential summer programs are also problematic for her and independent college admission is also not in play.

We would have had her take it just for fun/practice/information anyway-- if it hadn't been such a pain to set up.

I just wanted to mention that for anyone else who has a child with a second exceptionality-- this adds another layer and a lot of time to the process.

That makes perfect sense. You can always do a sample test at home and get a pretty good idea how she'd score so that takes care of the information purposes part of it.

Thank you; that is a really terrific idea.

How did I never think of that??

Oddly enough, Snoopy did much better on the real deal than on the practice exam. Starting to remember now why I thought he would get a 25..... that is what he had on the practice exam.

LOL

Mary

Awesome score mayreeh! Did your son take it on Feb. 12th? Anyone else get scores back yet? I heard they are really quick on getting scores out but I had my dd take the writing part also. I think it takes 2 weeks longer to grade.

Dd12 took it on 2/12 as well -- at least that sounds like about the right date. She went to a party the night before and went on way too little sleep and no prep, but she did reasonably well. We just got an e-mail yesterday that her scores were available online. Apparently ACT doesn't have the same deal as the SAT where you cannot access scores online before age 13.

I really wish that we had the $ for the Duke Marine Lab through TIP b/c she does qualify for their "Center" program but $3800 is out of the budget for this year. Maybe next year we'll use her ACT scores from this year and see if we can get financial aid. eta: She's an 8th grader so we're past the application deadline for TIP summer programs for that grade for this summer.

I had read somewhere that you cannot access ACT scores online if under 13. Did you have to create an account?

They emailed me her login name which isn't something I had created. It seemed to be a combo of her name and something else. I tried to login and just said that I had forgotten the password and they sent me a new password. I was then able to login and get her scores. They do know her age. I put it on the application. I don't know. When she took the SAT last year that was the case -- we couldn't set up an online account b/c she was 11.

The actual printed copy of dd's Feb ACT scores came in the mail yesterday so maybe you all won't have too long to wait if you haven't gotten them yet.