The state will pay for all students to take pre-ACT

A new initiative will allow all students in public high schools to take tests that prepare them to take the ACT, a national college entrance exam administered to all juniors in Illinois.

Interested districts now can offer freshmen and sophomores pre-ACT tests, designed to predict how well students will do on the ACT as juniors.

The program will cost about $2.3 million to $2.4 million, depending on participation, Illinois State Board of Education spokesman Matthew Vanover said.

Many suburban schools already offer the tests. Schools now will be reimbursed for those tests at the state-negotiated rate, Vanover said.

The state pitched the program as a way to monitor student achievement in the first two years of high school.

Currently, all third- through eighth-graders are tested under the federal No Child Left Behind law.

But once students enter high school, the state doesn't require they take another standardized test until their junior year.

"By using the … assessments, school districts will no longer have the two-year gap in testing data," state Superintendent of Education Christopher A. Koch said in a statement.

The state focused on testing materials for the ACT because Illinois juniors already take the national test as part of the Prairie State Achievement Exam, which determines whether high schools meet state and federal standards.