Racial Gap Widens on ACT College Entrance Examination

In 2009 nearly 200,000 college-bound African Americans took the ACT college entrance examination. They made up 13 percent of all ACT test takers.

Black students had an average combined score of 16.9. (The ACT is scored on a scale of 1 to 36.) This is the same average score achieved by black students in 2008.

In 2009 white students had an average ACT score of 22.2. This was up slightly from 22.1 in 2008. Therefore, there was a slight increase in the racial scoring gap on the ACT test.

Since 2006 the average black score has declined by 0.2 points whereas the average white score has increased by 0.2 points.

Copyright © 2009. The Journal of Blacks in Higher Education. All rights reserved.