Along with the finishing up of construction and the new lunch room this year LT has accomplished a great deal, but on an academic level LT has broken two school records related to the ACT. The ACT, “American College Testing,” is a standardized test based on information learned in high school, and is accepted in applications by all four-year colleges in the United States.

The class of 2015 not only broke Lyons Township High School’s record of the highest average in the school’s history, but also the highest number of students taking the ACT.

According to Scott Eggerding, the Director of Curriculum and Instruction, the class of 2015 achieved a high average of 24.3 due to prior testing and better preparation for the ACT.

The previous testing that students were exposed to included the ACT Explore test, which was taken in eighth grade. The class average for the Explore testing was 18.2. Projected growth for each class is 6 points, but the 2016 class grew 6.1, therefore raising the average.

“I took the [ACT] once without practice and saw what I needed to work on,” Rory O’Donnell ‘15 said. “Then I got a tutor to work on [practice tests] and took it again.”

In 2015, the state of Illinois had an ACT average of 20.7, whereas the national average was 21.

Along with the high average, 991 students took the ACT at LT, which is the highest turnout in LT’s history.