The February ACT has come and gone, and a small weight has been lifted off of junior students’ shoulders. For the next few weeks the ACT is almost like the forbidden word, either because students don’t want to jinx their scores or they want to forget about the atrocity that went down during those 4 hours sitting in the test room. For those who are lucky, once they get their scores back they won’t need to think about the test ever again. But for the majority of the students, in a few weeks it will be time to get back to continuing the ritual of cramming practice problems into their busy schedule. Already long days that consist of school and extracurriculars are going to be further bombarded with more work. For busy students like me, I have been unable to study as much as I would like these past few months. Now that the chances to achieve my goal score tick away, I am trying to make up for all the work that I have missed the past 6 months. Because of my busy summer schedule I only have one more opportunity left, April. I’m sure I’m not the only one who is feeling this pressure, and I assume that for others February was their last chance. That being said, I believe that Ladue should offer an official ACT during a school day. One day in March or April, the high school should have all the Juniors take the day off of classes to take an ACT at the school. This will give students another chance to improve their scores and become more familiar with the testing format and the wording of questions. In addition, the test should be free to all students. This will give students who can’t take the ACT in their free time, due to time or monetary issues, a chance at the test. It will give students the ability to prioritize their sleep and stress levels and allow them to also prepare for the test. This will not only increase their ability to achieve their goal scores, it will also increase their grades at school because they will be less stressed and get more sleep. Other schools in the area have already implemented this idea into their school schedules. In early October Kirkwood high school had an ACT day where every  student took it. In addition, Parkway South has also hosted one for their students. Ladue should follow in the footsteps of these schools and also implement a day where students can take a real ACT during a school day. If it’s too late to change the schedule this year, at least think about planning a day in the next school year.