Practice Makes Perfect for LZHS Student Who Scored 36 on ACT

Nick Landgrebe, who will enter his senior year at in the fall, is known as the student with the perfect ACT score. Someday, he’d like to be known for competency in his field, engineering.

“I would like to be known as somebody who is good at what he does. I would value that more as a title than the kid who got the 36,” he said.

Nationally, just one-tenth of 1 percent of students who take the ACT achieve a top score, according to a news release from Lake Zurich Community Unit District 95. 

Nick plans to follow up his success on the ACT with success at college first. He is considering attending either the University of Illinois or the University of California Institute of Technology (Caltech). He plans to study electrical engineering with a minor in either mechanical engineering or computer science.

Nick learned of his perfect score on the ACT in May. He said people still are congratulating him on his score.

“It was overwhelming the recognition I got. I was not expecting it; the school put it on the website and the billboard. I had people I had never spoken to in my entire high school career congratulating me,” he said. 

Nick credits his success on the test with a number of factors, including his well-developed test-taking skills and the teachers at . He took the test two previous times, receiving scores of  33 and 32. He recommends that students who want to do well on the ACT take the test more than once.

Outside of school, Nick spends a lot of time working on software programming for his dad, Dave, who is a software contractor. 

ACT test scores are accepted by all major U.S. colleges, and exceptional scores of 36 provide colleges with evidence of student readiness for the academic rigors that lie ahead.

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