For thirteen years, most of Dogwood’s college-bound students have achieved their best results on the ACT, not the SAT. One big reason is that ACT is more straightforward like school tests, unlike the SAT that makes students ‘think’ more (and often overthink) to figure out what each question is asking. The SAT also puts more weight on the math score (50% of total score), while the ACT math section is 25% of the composite score — so ACT has usually been the better test for students with average or below-average math skills.
For several decades, the downside of ACT is that students must answer 215 questions in three hours. In the math section, for example, they must solve 60 problems in 60 minutes. Even when students know the math concepts well, they tend to make careless mistakes when facing such extreme time pressure.
Tutors and students have prayed for years for a shorter ACT exam. When the new digital SAT launched in March with only 98 questions, ACT finally had to act. This week they announced a new, shorter digital ACT to be offered in April 2025. A shorter paper-based ACT is expected to start in September 2025. This is good news for students and makes us wonder what took so long.
As shown in the chart below, the new ACT will have fewer questions in each of the four sections, which will increase the average time per question compared to the current ACT. They say the difficulty of the questions will stay the same, which remains to be seen. As students use the friendlier timing to get more questions correct, that could put pressure on the scoring curves. With fewer questions on each section, that makes every question count more.
In June, ACT administered a trial of a shorter digital test that used the times and question counts used in the above chart (Future ACT). If they were to keep the same four-section format on the new “Core ACT,” it would have 171 questions and take 2 hours & 50 minutes. To be competitive with the SAT with its 2-hour & 14-minute length, ACT is making its Science section optional. With only three required sections – English, Math & Reading – the Core ACT will have 131 questions in 2 hours & 5 minutes. The ACT also has its Writing (essay) section that has been optional since 2005 but almost nobody takes it anymore. The SAT dropped its optional essay three years ago because colleges no longer find timed essays valuable.
ACT has always taken pride in its Science section, which is actually a data exercise that requires very little prior science knowledge. SAT never had a science section, although they have included a sampling of data questions in their reading and math sections. In our data-driven world, ACT has held firm that data skills are needed in careers as diverse as medicine, law, business, communications, and more. Now that ACT needs to compete with SAT on test length, however, they are sacrificing the ACT Science section by making it optional.
Because ACT Science will be optional, the new ACT Core Composite will contain only English, Math & Reading. This change will affect students’ scores in different ways, and we don’t know how colleges and scholarship agencies will accept the new ACT format. The only sure thing is the age-old competition between SAT (College Board) and ACT will continue. We feel the shorter ACT is a positive change that will help most of our students. We look forward to more details about the implementation of the Core ACT.
Please contact us for more information about choosing ACT or SAT for your student.