I took the ACT with writing in early February and received by scores. My composite was 30, about as expected, with a 30 and 33 for Reading and English. However, my writing was a 20. In school (honors English classes and AP history classes) I do well on both in class and out of class essays. I had done ACT prep using the Real ACT prep guide prior to taking it. What worries me most is that walking away from it, I felt that it had gone pretty well and honestly can’t figure out why my score was so low. I addressed all perspectives, stated my own opinion, included a counterargument and had an introduction and conclusion. I’m taking the ACT again on Tuesday, March 1 and am wondering if anyone would have advice or insights for me. Thanks so much!
Yes. The essay score may be out of 36, but it does not share the same percentile ranges as the multi-choice. You can’t judge an essay score the same way you judge a multi-choice score. It’s not your fault that it makes no sense. It’s theirs. It’s misleading to make that score out of 36 like multichoice, but make the numbers have such different percentile ranks than the multi-choice. Colleges know it’s messed up… On top of that, there are just plain scoring errors-there’s a thread on people paying for a re-score of the essay on this forum. And now the news media is onto it: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/grade-point/wp/2016/02/12/act-essay-scores-are-inexplicably-low-causing-uproar-among-college-bound-students/
I just posted this on another thread but it may help here!
I got almost a perfect score in writing( I don’t know how ha). But I think using outside FACTS/STATS to support your perspective is what really helps your score. I usually do an intro then a thesis where I make sure that it is very very clear what side I am taking. A lot of people don’t take a firm stance and that’s where things get confusing for the reader. Don’t contradict yourself- it’s more common then you think. I don’t really use the perspectives to backup my opinion because they are just perspectives so it’s not really concrete. So let’s say you are writing about school uniforms and you want to say that you think they should be allowed. Perspective 1: ban them because they are not expressive, P2: keep them as students need to be more modest. So in your first paragraph you say as perspective 2 expresses uniforms hep maintain modestly on campus. Then I would go onto EXPLAIN the ways in which uniforms do this and how it positively impacts students. I would use 2 of the perspectives to directly support my answer, then I would use the 3rd as a counter argument. For example; although the 3rd perspective claims that uniforms hurt the students personal expression, they actually allow students to be more themselves(idk I just made that up ha). Then I would go onto explain why this is the case. Finally somewhere in one of my paragraphs I would include a concrete outside example or stat, such as studies prove that 80% of students saw an increase in grades as a result of uniforms, or just something that directly supports my argument that I’m trying to make in relation to the single perspective. Sorry this might be long and confusing but hopefully it helps!!
Thanks so much for all the advice!!!