ACT test shows little difference between men and women

The A-C-T results released this past week show female scores declined by a tiny percentage, while the scores of male test-takers went up ever so slightly. But Ken Gullette, a spokesman for A-C-T, says there’s no so-called “gender gap.” Gullette cites statistics from Illinois and Colorado, where all high schoolers take the A-C-T. He says there’s really no difference in the scores of male students compared to female students. There may be a statistical reason for the slight, tenth-of-a-percentage difference in male versus female scores, according to Gullette. He says more woman are taking the A-C-T, and when you have a larger pool of students taking the tests, that tends to have a “downward pressure” on scores because the “pool is bigger.” The A-C-T results released this past week also show what you’d expect: students who take the toughest courses in high school get the best scores on the college entrance exam. As Radio Iowa reported earlier this week, Iowa students had an average score of 22 on the A-C-T — ranking the state second in the nation, tied with students in Minnesota.