ACT: ACT Assessment. Students take this test in place of, or in addition to, the SAT for entrance into college. The exam is offered six times a year, in February, April, June, September, October, and December. It is more widely used in the Midwest region of the US. It covers English, reading, science, and math. Your Complete Guide to the ACT ; Find out why Kaplan is the smart choice for ACT prep. Take a free practice ACT. And lots more ACT information. The ACT is the most widely accepted college entrance exam. It provides educational and career planning for students and teachers at every level. The ACT measures the high school students' general educational development and ability to complete college-level work. The test consist of four multiple-choice tests covering skill in English, mathematics, reading, and science. There are a total of 215 questions: English- 75; Math- 60; Reading- 40; and Science- 40. The highest possible ACT score is 36. The ACT started offering a writing test in February, 2005. It is an optional Writing Test, which measures skills in planning and writing a short essay. The ACT has seen an increase in the number of test takers recently, and the amount of students taking them virtually equals that of the SAT. Over 2.1 million ACTs were administered during 2004-2005. The national average ACT composite score for 2005 was 20.9. The American College Testing Program (ACT) or American College Test, is a college-entrance achivement test that emerged in 1959 as a competitor to the College Board's Scholastic Aptitude Test, (SAT). Some students find that they perform better on the ACT than on the SAT due to question wording and content. In theory, the ACT, being an achievement test, measures the knowledge a student learned in high school. The SAT, an aptitude test, attempts to predict college freshmen year GPA. The ACT (unlike the SAT) does not take points off for a wrong answer, making it to the advantage of the test taker to answer or guess at every single question. The ACT is most widely used in the midwest and southeast United States. The SAT is more popular in the northeast and the west coasts. The rise of colleges accepting the ACT is partly due to various criticisms concerning the effectiveness and fairness of the SAT.