<p>D did better on the ACT. It was more like the tests she was used to. She took it twice and got the exact same score both times. </p>
<p>But I echo that you should have your D take each test once - it doesn’t cost that much, and it’s one extra Saturday morning out of her life. Then you’ll know. If she balks, at least have her take a practice test for each one and see which one goes better. Then whichever one she does better on, she can take it once more at the beginning of Senior year, just to see if it improves. Not high stress or high cost. She may do well enough to qualify for an honors program or some other extra benefit. And even if you don’t “need” a scholarship, if they’re going to offer her one that’s money that stays in your pocket!</p>
<p>If a college says they take either score, they take either score. Don’t worry about them “favoring” one or the other - especially a state flagship.</p>
<p>My D, who was also a HS jr year exchanger took the ACT spring of her sophomore year. As you say, if the focus of the exchange is language acquisition, English language nuance can take a bit of a hit in the year abroad, and potentially affect test scores. We intended for her to take it again fall of Sr. year. But things were so busy, and her score quite adequate, so we never did get around to that retake. Now we’re curious as to how good a score she might have gotten…but, oh well. We also wanted her to be actively involved in math class when taking the test. </p>
<p>Both my girls did both tests, and scored better on the ACT.</p>
<p>The answer as to which is better depends upon the kid. I prefer the ACT for my daughter and wasn’t sure for my son.</p>
<p>I posted this someplace a year ago so I may not remember things perfectly. You can teach the SAT strategies somewhat. But, for a dyslexic kid or for kids who don’t respond well to tricky questions, the ACTs may be easier as the SAT really has questions designed to trick the good but not great reader/thinker. The ACT does not have trick questions. A college counselor recommended the ACT for my dyslexic son. He took both and with appropriate accommodations, he did equally well on both except for the ACT writing. He actually thought the standards for grading writing were better on the ACT than the SAT but he said he got a really difficult prompt for the ACT. The good thing about the ACT is that you don’t have to submit it. This was not true of the SATs (although that is changing for some schools who submit to a new College Board policy but not for others).</p>
<p>For him the math was trivial if you read each question carefully. It draws on basic algebra for the most part. He said both tests were roughly the same on math, if I remember correctly, though he got a 34 on the ACT math and had no errors at all on the SAT math.</p>
<p>He said that the ACT science was just reading graphs and making sense of them. He hadn’t taken earth science and had not studied biology in a long time and nonetheless got a 35. So, you don’t actually have to know the science, just how to reason logically from graphs. </p>
<p>One other thing I’ve heard is that the ACT is tighter from a time standpoint than the SAT. So, time management is very important.</p>
<p>Because my daughter is not as good with tricky questions and they make her anxious, she will probably take the ACTs.</p>