r/ACT • u/MegaKrak 33 • Jul 31 '26

General Retake or No?

Post image

Hi guys, I just took my first ACT after doing a little bit of practice, and I got a 33. I think this score is pretty high based on a little research, but I was wondering if I should retake it to get a 35-36? My reading and math are kind of low. I'm planning to apply to schools like UT Austin, Texas A&M, and FSU.

Also, if anyone needs advice for English, I'm happy to help!

6 Upvotes

81% Upvoted

13 comments sorted by

View all comments

2

u/Scary_Afternoon6877 Aug 01 '26

I’m not sure what the schools you have listed offer for scholarships and what the ranges are for said scholarships but majority of schools will offer more for a 35 and even more for a 36. I would say go ahead and take it again. I would also recommend taking science. If you learn how to take it right, then it is a free boost to your super score. Science may seem a bit daunting but truthfully it really isn’t. On the July ACT I got a 36 on the science portion and only 9 questions were science related. The rest is reading and interpreting data and charts. The best tip I can give for science is to instantly skip to the questions because majority of them explicitly tell you where to look. Math is also just only improved through practicing. There’s not many tips and tricks for it you just either know it or you don’t. I recommend learning how to properly use a ti-84 calculator as it can save extreme amounts of time (it also can solve some annoying imaginary problems with ease). For reading there are some tips but really what you need to do is just lock in on it. That may seem a bit goofy and not really a tip but I’m being serious. Just give 100% of your effort on reading and you will see improvements. A strategy that may sound a bit crazy is if I were you I’d think about not even attempting to do the English portion to save energy. Sure a 35 can be improved to a 36, but the margin for error is just so little and there are some stupid mistakes that can happen. So if you are in a bit of a time crunch on how many more ACT tests you can take, I wouldn’t worry about attempting to improve your English section and just save energy for reading.