Here’s how Columbus area schools performed on 2017 ACT

For the second straight year, the Muscogee County School District’s average composite score on the ACT is the highest since MCSD has kept track of its results on the college entrance exam, now for 12 years.

MCSD’s students in the graduating class of 2017 averaged a composite score of 19.7 — an increase of 0.3 points compared to 2016. That growth kept pace with the state’s gain and closed the gap with the national average composite score of 21.0, which increased by 0.2 points. MCSD, however, still lags behind the state’s average composite score, which is 21.4.

The maximum ACT score is 36.

For the fourth straight year, MCSD improved its average score on all the ACT subject tests: English, math, reading and science.

MCSD superintendent David Lewis told the Ledger-Enquirer in an email Thursday, “We are pleased with our continued progress to date. However, we realize there is still work to be done to ensure more students meet our expectations as full-option graduates.”

MCSD chief academic officer Keith Seifert added, “Our students are challenging themselves with more rigorous coursework as we expand the college and career readiness options through greater AP (Advanced Placement), IB (International Baccalaureate) and dual-enrollment course options and earlier opportunities to take high school courses in middle school.”

Nearly all the Columbus area high schools improved their average ACT scores during the past year. The exceptions are Chattahoochee County and Smiths Station.

ChattCo’s performance decreased on all but the math test. The number of test-takers in ChattCo also decreased, from 21 to 12. Smiths Station’s performance decreased on all the subject tests and the composite score while its number of test-takers increased from 421 to 440.

Responding to speculation that the 2017 ACT was easier than the 2016 version, Ed Colby, the ACT’s senior director of media and public relations, told the Ledger-Enquirer, “The ACT test this year is the same difficulty as the ACT test last year and next year. It is a standardized test, and we make sure that scores mean the same thing across time.”

ACT, the Iowa-based company that stands for American College Testing but has expanded to other products and programs unrelated to college testing, releases the national and state reports but relies on the local school districts to release their scores. The Ledger-Enquirer made those requests this week. The scores for each of the nine high schools in MCSD are expected to be available “in the next several days,” Patrick Knopf, the district’s director of research, accountability and assessment, told the Ledger-Enquirer.

Forty-three percent of MCSD’s students in the class of 2017 took the ACT, totaling 2,006 test-takers. Although that percentage decreased by 1 from 44 percent in 2016, it has increased by 7 from 36 percent in 2013. The statewide figure in Georgia is 55 percent.

Alabama is one of 17 states that gave the ACT to 100 percent of their 2017 graduating class as part of their state’s measurement of student performance. The others are Arkansas, Colorado, Kentucky, Louisiana, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nevada, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, Utah, Wisconsin and Wyoming.

Nationwide, 60 percent of 2017 high school graduates took the ACT.

This story was originally published September 7, 2017 at 4:31 PM with the headline "Here’s how Columbus area schools performed on 2017 ACT."