DESE considering ending free ACT program
For the past three years, the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education has paid for all Missouri high school juniors to take the ACT once for free. With Gov. Eric Greitens’ new budget, that opportunity may cease to exist.
Last week, Shari LePage, DESE’s chief budget officer, revealed that the budget’s appropriations to performance assessment were $4 million short of what DESE requested. To cover this budget shortfall, LePage suggested pushing back development of a new state standardized test or ceasing funding free ACT tests for high school juniors, calling it “one big lump of money that is not mandatory.”
Division of Learning Services deputy commissioner Stacey Preis said options for making up the $4 million “are pretty limited,” and that if things get tight, the funding could get cut easily.
Currently, high school juniors are mandated to take the ACT, which is being provided free of charge, in April. Any extra tests they take are to be paid for by the students, but providing the one free exam, according to Maryville High School counselor Becky Houtchens, removes the onus from the student to register from the test.
“It’s a bit of a process to register and take the exam,” Houtchens said. “You have to upload a photo, put in all of your information, and do several other things in order to register for the exam.
“Now that it’s being provided free of charge, we’re doing that here at the school so that all students have to do is show up. It’s a daunting task to register, which may cause some students to not do it at all, but like this, it’s really easy.”
This year, juniors around the state will take the ACT on Wednesday, April 19. The free ACT program was started as part of DESE’s “Top 10 by 20” initiative, which pushed for Missouri to be one of the top 10 states for education by the year 2020.
Houtchens mentioned that the ACT was just one of the exams the school administered. The school also administers state-required end-of-course exams in Biology, English II, Algebra I, and Government, which they try to do in the same week as the statewide ACT day.
In the fall, Maryville also has a “practice test” day where freshmen and sophomores are given a pre-ACT-type test and juniors are given a practice ACT. That practice ACT is usually a retired ACT test given in years past.
The one free ACT test will not affect students who qualify for free and reduced lunch, as they are already eligible for test waivers past the state’s free ACT, except that those students will still need to register themselves and take it on a weekend instead of during a school day.