Need advice today: Should DD take ACT a third time?

Students and parents, seeking your advice ASAP:

Daughter is supposed to take the ACT again tomorrow but I’m now leaning toward not having her do it.

She took two previous ACTs. Composite on each was 33 – almost identical; superscoring the two doesn’t really move the needle, so a solid 33.

This time she has not prepped at all–wants to do it cold. She had prep especially for the second of the two she has already taken. I think she is likely to do worse on this one than 33, since she hasn’t prepared additionally. She does know how the test works and has the experience of taking it twice but I’m thinking there just isn’t a reason to try to do it once more.

As far as I can see from ,my research, at the colleges she’s considering (more may come along), 33 is a very-good-to-strong score for admissions. These colleges don’t seem to ask for ALL ACT scores but either the best composite, or two or more scores to superscore. (Some but not many colleges seem to want all ACT scores to see the “testing trend” as one put it, but none of her colleges so far want that.)

I’d welcome thoughts from the CC community–I know you’ve been there and done that! Thank you.

If she is going to take it again, I personally would wait until October 27th test date which gives her 7 weeks to prep for it? Otherwise she may be wasting her time taking it cold?

If she’s not going to prep, she shouldn’t take it again and risk getting the same score or lower. If she’s going to take it a third time, she should absolutely prep for it.

Has she tried the SAT? (Some students prefer one test over another).

Does she want to take it tomorrow? If so, let her go ahead and take it.

If she knows the material, and is familiar with the test, she probably doesn’t really need to prep again. Whether she gets a higher score vs. another 33 probably depends on the actual test given this time. Also, it sounds like the prep she did for the second test didn’t change her score - no wonder she wants to take this one cold! She may actually feel less pressure this time around.

My senior took his ACT without prep (he did one practice test) and his only strategy was to answer everything as quickly as possible. He wasn’t the least bit stressed about it and I think that helped him.

She’s a senior, so Oct. 27 is too late to do it again in time for any early action/ED applications (not sure if she’s doing any) and possibly also nail-bitingly late for results for Jan. 1 RD applications…

Thanks, all, for the comments! I knew CC would come through with some experienced posters. She doesn’t really want to take it, and though she had good prep for the previous two times, it’s been months (last one was in spring and no prep or review over summer), so I’m not confident that she can do without at least refreshing her memory before this test. Not many colleges demand to see every score you get on the ACT, but some actually do, and it would be a risk to have two 33s and one lower outlier, I think.

Looking at the colleges she’s considering, all of them list their “middle 50 percent” ACT range for this fall’s freshman class, and 33 is at the highest end of that range for every one of those colleges, so I think we’re going to tell her she doesn’t have to take this test tomorrow.

@conrad2. if your daughter scores significantly lower on tomorrow’s test (which may be possible considering she didn’t prep and isn’t in “testing mode”), she does run the risk of having the ACT folks cancel her 33 score because they might think that she cheated to obtain it. Seems ridiculous until you read the thread on CC about the ACT doing exactly this to many families.

ETA: http://talk.qa.collegeconfidential.com/sat-act-tests-test-preparation/1987200-act-testing-wrongly-accusing-cheating-2017.html#latest