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Matching State Standards to ACT's College Readiness Standards

Eighteen states currently utilize one or more components of ACT's College Readiness System (the ACT, PLAN, EXPLORE, QualityCore, and WorkKeys) as part of their state assessment programs. Two states (Illinois and Michigan) also utilize the ACT and WorkKeys for NCLB/AYP purposes.

At the request of a state, ACT will conduct a match between state standards and ACT's College Readiness Standards to identify how the domain of knowledge and skills measured by ACT assessments align with individual state standards. For many of the states that have requested a state match report, the majority of their state standards are assessed on the ACT, PLAN, or EXPLORE. However, ACT's College Readiness System of assessments does not cover all state standards in all subject areas. In these cases, a match report can serve as a preliminary guide for utilizing ACT assessments in a state testing program's measurement of state standards or its ability to meet NCLB/AYP requirements. The state match report also identifies those ACT College Readiness Standards that are not represented in the state's standards.

Match reports are currently available for 42 states. In most cases, two alignment documents are present for each match:

• The state match report summarizes the findings of the match and also shows the specific state standards and objectives that are measured by ACT's College Readiness System of assessments. Those state standards included in the domain of knowledge and skills measured by the ACT assessments are clearly indicated by highlighting. The report also shows those College Readiness Standards—standards that are empirically proven to prepare students for credit-bearing postsecondary coursework—that were not identified in the state's standards.
• The supplement is a side-by-side listing of specific ACT College Readiness skills and WorkKeys level skills (if included) that correspond to the state standards measured by ACT assessments.