<p>My friend took the ACT a total of 5 times over a period of a little over a year, and he didn't realize that UPenn wasn't score choice until about a month ago. He said he viewed the earliest 3 tests as "practice". Because of this, he'd usually skip one section (by guessing randomly) since he already knew he was going to do well on that section if he tried and he would take the ACT "for real" later.</p>
<p>Will this hurt his chances?</p>
<p>UPenn is his dream school. He showed me his scores and the 1st 4 ranged from 28 to 31, and you could easily see which sections he "skipped" because there would always be one (usually reading or science) that was in the low 20s. His last score was a 35.</p>
<p>Should he mention why his first 4 scores were so low in his application? Will taking it 5 times hurt his chances? My college counsellor told him not to worry about it and that 5 times was nothing to worry about since several people, according to him, take it 8+ times (one person at my school took the SAT over 12 times last year haha). I've only taken it 3 times though and 5 seems a bit much to me. Thoughts?</p>