“At Pillow Academy, a private school in Greenwood, Mississippi, Dia Chawla, 18, is far from your average high school senior.
“A superstar athlete on the varsity tennis and basketball teams, Chawla is also is a Heisman High School Scholarship winner, captain of the state championship dance team and got a perfect score on the ACT.”
(Abby Cruzvia. “Teen with perfect ACT score launches testing diversity preparation club.” ABC News. December 13, 2021.)
Can you even imagine the life of this incredible young lady. Her diverse talents and outstanding intellect are off the charts. A perfect score of 36 on the ACT! There are 4 sections on the ACT : English, Math, Reading, and Science. On a scale of 1–36, the current average ACT score is 21.
How rare is a perfect ACT score? The company PrepScholar that creates online ACT/SAT prep programs reports “out of the 1.9 million students who take the test every year, only about 3,700 get the highest possible ACT score – 0.313% of ACT test takers.”
The Princeton Review reports: “A 'good' ACT score depends on the colleges and universities you are considering. A score of 23 on the ACT is above the current national average and will make you a strong applicant at many universities, but it may fall below the average score for accepted students at more selective colleges. The higher your ACT score, the more options are open to you.”
Here's the thing about Dia Chawla: she told "Good Morning America" that she thinks the standardized test used for college admissions in the United States -- where the higher a student's score, the higher the chance of them getting into a competitive university -- has its pitfalls.
"I scored 36 on the ACT and I [made] this ACT class for the students, but I actually strongly dislike the ACT because I think it is a very unfair test," Chawla said.
"It's not a measure of intelligence. It's a measure of preparation and how you can access the resources to prep for it," she said.
(Abby Cruzvia. “Teen with perfect ACT score launches testing diversity preparation club.” ABC News. December 13, 2021.)
According to ACT.org, underserved minority students were more likely to have lower ACT scores than white students; however, they were also more likely to have lower high school GPAs and to take less rigorous coursework in high school.
As a volunteer at her local Boys & Girls Club, Chawla said she noticed this discrepancy firsthand. She said she saw students from a neighboring public school lack supplies, need help with their homework and lack resources such as stable Wi-Fi -- all things that Chawla and her classmates at her private school had access to.
As a young woman of Indian descent living in Mississippi, Chawla said she felt as though it was her duty to serve people of color.
"It's in the heart of the South. It's the home of a lot of historical events during the civil rights movement," Dia said.
"And it's kind of crazy how, what, 50 years later, nothing has really changed," Chawla said. "The schools had integrated, but just because of the high cost and the demographics of this area, it's almost as if Brown v. Board never happened."
Chawla said she has faced prejudice personally. She said her Indian descent and features, along with her Mississippi accent, have made her feel like an outsider because she's not seen as black or white. However, she said those feeling have led her to want to bring change and unite all students from different backgrounds.
"I'm not going to act like I've faced any … just really blatant inequalities, but you can't ignore the fact that they are there and even though I'm not facing them, there's so many around me that are," she said.
Well, this conscientious student decided to do something about the problem. Dia created the ACT Diversity Preparation Club. Not only did she create the club, but she made it free.
"Bringing [students of color] on an equal standing with others, I think that was the goal," Chawla said.
(Abby Cruz. “Teen with perfect ACT score launches testing diversity preparation club.” Good Morning America. https://www.goodmorningamerica.com/living/story/teen-perfect-act-score-launches-testing-diversity-preparation-81605862. December 13, 2021.)
Chawla said that ACT scores are lower in public schools compared to private schools, and that divide was something she wanted to tackle by giving others an opportunity to improve their scores.
The ACT Diversity Preparation Club invited students from both private and public schools to show up on Sundays at a class taught by Chawla. They get to learn in a space without any distractions, use stable Wi-Fi and eat a meal with each other.
Can you guess the conclusion Dia made after establishing her Diversity Club?”
"This class only showed me … more discrepancies that I hadn't seen before," Chawla said.
"The students I was teaching [geometry taken] out of their curriculum … and that's not something I can teach. That's a bigger underlying issue just due to teacher shortages and economic factors. And it just showed me that there's so much more work to be done and that this is just the beginning. And this could be a stepping stone to something more for sure."
Dia Chawla continues to work to better inequalities. She willingly accepts this charge as her personal obligation.
Note On the Heisman
Dia Chawla was named the 2021 female winner for the Heisman High School Scholarship. The scholarship is given to high school athletes who maintain a GPA of 3.0 or better and are, “proven leaders and role models within their school and community.”
As a national winner, Chawla was awarded a $10,000 college scholarship
She’s also a star in three sports:
She’s captain of the tennis team that’s won two state championships
She’s a member of the state championship winning basketball team
She’s captain of the state championship dance team
On top of all of this, she’s racked up over 550 hours of volunteer work for groups like Boys and Girls Club, Greenwood Leflore Hospital, Greenwood Human Society and more.
She’s also the school student body president and class president, valedictorian, Spanish club president, and Academic Decathlon Team President.
Chawla's brother, Sunjay, was also chosen as the national winner when he was a senior at Pillow.
(Jacob Gallant. “Miss. teen named national winner of Heisman High School Scholarship.” WLBT 3. Jackson. December 02, 2021.)
Perspective
Do you share my perspective about Dia Chawla? She is a beautiful and gifted minority student in a challenging environment who excels at everything in which she is engaged. Yet, instead of basking in the honor and prestige she has so diligently earned, Dia chooses to use her intelligence to help others in need.
Why? Dia respects diversity and feels compelled to work to effect required changes that better those who may be less fortunate. Dia employs her mind, her experience, and her initiative to take action and realize a mission that helps others excel.
For Chawla, it's a “no brainer.” How easily she could have pushed ahead to her next personal goal and never looked back. Her recognition of responsibility is rare no matter what the age. For a high school senior – an 18-year-old in a private school – consider the magnitude of the accomplishment.
Ending Historical Note: ACT Scores
Seventeen students at a single high school in Ohio earned the top score — 36 — on the ACT college admission test, a feat believed to be highly unusual, if not unprecedented.
Walnut Hills High School, a high-achieving six-year public college preparatory school in Cincinnati, posted the news on its website, as did Cincinnati Public Schools.
The announcements said 17 students – nine juniors and eight seniors – received a “perfect” score, which is a composite of 36 on all four mandatory parts of the ACT (English, math, reading and science). The ACT is scored on a scale of 1 to 36. The average national score for 2018, the ACT reports on its website, was 20.8. A top score of 36 does not mean, however, that all questions were answered correctly.
How unusual is this? It is unclear. ACT spokesman Edward Colby said the organization does not track how many perfect scores come from a single school. About 0.2 percent of students nationwide who took the exam earned a 36 in 2018, he said.
Walnut Hills, which is called a high school but has students from grades seven through 12, has 2,400 students, according to its website, and is in the top 100 high schools in the U.S. News & World Report listing. In that ranking, it is listed as the leading high school in Ohio. Thirty percent of the school’s students are black, 7 percent are of two or more races, 5 percent are Asian, 2 percent are Hispanic, and most of the rest are white, U.S. News said in its 2018 data, and 19 percent are economically disadvantaged.
According to the school’s website, 87 percent of graduates leave with college credits because they took college-level courses in high school. The school opened in 1895 and has been in the same building since the early 1930s. The Walnut Hills website says:
“Walnut Hills offers a rigorous classical program, requiring three years of Latin for incoming 7th and 8th graders. There is an Advanced Placement Program offering 30 courses, more than any other school in the nation – public or private. The school has an outstanding cultural arts program which includes five dramatic/musical productions each year, AP studio art, and award winning bands and orchestras. There are 90 competitive sports teams and over 50 extra-curricular activities. The school participates in science and foreign language competitions, the National Mathematics Examination, First Lego Robotics, the Model United Nations, and the National Scholastic Art and Writing competition.”
(Valerie Strauss. “17 students from one high school get perfect scores on the ACT.” The Washington Post. April 24, 2019.)
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