Students' perfect scores just part of the story at St. Louis school

Published: 2006-02-16

ST. LOUIS (CNS) -- In the past 18 months, five students at St. Louis University High School have scored a perfect 36 on their ACT college entrance exams. One of those students also scored a "perfect triple" of 2,400 on the three sections of the SAT assessment test. And yet another student at the school earned a perfect score of 240 on the Preliminary SAT. To appreciate these numbers, consider that only 251 students nationwide scored 36 on the ACT tests during the 2004-05 school year, out of more than 2.1 million tests administered. The current St. Louis University High senior class has four of the students who earned perfect SAT scores; 36 states had fewer than four students do so in the same time period. "Just getting a 36 on the ACT is rare," ACT spokeswoman Kristin Crouse told the St. Louis Review, the archdiocesan newspaper. "It's wonderful that they have five. The ACT is a curriculum-based achievement test and tests what the students learned in high school and what they know. They are obviously very well-prepared students."

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