As indicated in Part 1 of this series, there has been an increase over the past 10 years in the share of ACT-tested students who take the ACT for the first time before the 12th grade. Among the high school class of 2014, three out of four students first tested before the 12th grade. Taking the test earlier has several advantages in terms of expanding college opportunities for students. The first advantage is that, by testing earlier, students’ names become available within the ACT Educational Opportunity Service at a time when colleges are most often using ACT Educational Opportunity Service (EOS) to select student names for marketing and recruitment. Figure 10 shows the cumulative percentage of names selected by colleges through EOS over the course of 24 months that correspond with students’ 11th- and 12th-grade years of high school. As seen in the figure, by the end of September of students’ 12th-grade year, 75% of all names selected by colleges have already been chosen. This means that 75% of all names selected by colleges through EOS do not include any students who test for the first time in 12th grade, as these students’ names do not enter EOS until October of their 12th-grade year at the earliest. By January of the students’ 12th-grade year, 95% of all student names selected by colleges through EOS have been chosen.

Overall, 84% of students who opted into EOS had their names selected by at least one college. Yet, as suggested by Figure 10, students who tested earlier were far more likely than students who tested later to be selected by at least one college through EOS. In particular, 88% of students who first tested before 12th grade had their names selected by at least one college through EOS, compared to only 70% of students who first tested in 12th grade. Figure 11 shows the difference in EOS selection rates by time of first testing and ACT Composite Score range. As the figure illustrates, differences in EOS selection rates were more pronounced among students in the lowest ACT Composite ranges. For example, among students in the lowest ACT Composite score range—i.e., 1–15—students who first tested before the 12th grade were nearly twice as likely as their peers who first tested during the 12th grade to have their names selected by at least one college through EOS. These differences in EOS selection rate by time of first testing diminish as ACT Composite increases.

Among those students who opted into EOS, the average number of colleges that selected them was 16.7. This overall average, however, masks some important differences by the grade level in which students first took the ACT. Specifically, students who first tested before 12th grade had their names selected by an average of 20.8 colleges, compared to an average of only 4.9 colleges among students who first tested during 12th grade. Although, in general, students who first test in 12th grade tend to be lower achieving than those who first test prior to 12th grade, differences in the average number of colleges that select a student’s name appear to be due to test timing more than student achievement. Figure 12, which shows the average number of colleges selecting a student’s name by time of first testing and ACT Composite score range, illustrates this point. As the figure shows, within all ACT Composite score ranges, EOS students who first tested during 12th grade had their names selected by a smaller average number of colleges than their peers who first tested before 12th grade, and this gap by time of first testing widens substantially as students’ ACT Composite score increases.

The second advantage is that, by testing earlier, students have a longer window in which to make contact with colleges in order to express interest in attending. One common way for students to signal interest to a college is to request that an official ACT score report be sent to the admissions office. Although there are differences in the average number of official score reports sent to colleges by grade level first tested, these grade level differences may be attributed to differences in students’ motivation to attend college as opposed to the actual timing of the test. To try to account for the fact that students who test earlier in high school may be more motivated to attend college, we looked at the average number of colleges to which students had score reports sent by students’ achievement level and by whether or not they took the ACT before 12th grade on a voluntary or a mandatory (i.e., statewide administration) basis. Figure 13 illustrates these differences. As seen in the figure, as ACT Composite score increases, so does the average number of colleges to which official score reports are sent. Also worth noting from the figure is that within each score range, students who took the ACT before 12th grade on a mandatory basis sent their scores to either a larger or a comparable average number of colleges as their peers who tested before 12th grade on a voluntary basis. Compared to these two student groups, students who took the ACT during 12th grade on a voluntary basis sent their scores to a lower average number of colleges.