Kira Donn has achieved a milestone that many will not ever reach. She has earned a perfect score on the ACT!
The junior discovered her perfect score after taking the college entrance exam in March, along with all the eleventh graders at the school.
Donn is still in disbelief.
“I was shocked. I’ve been working and studying for so long on the ACT. To see my hard work pay off made me really happy. I had tears of joy [when I saw the score],” she said.
Donn is the second North Little Rock High School student within the past year to achieve a 36 -- the highest score possible -- on the ACT. Last spring, Jonah Pulliam earned a perfect score on the test.
Last month was Donn’s fourth time taking the ACT. As a freshman, she scored 30. As a sophomore, she earned a 33. In February 2025, as a junior, she made a 35.
On the fourth try, she did not walk away thinking she had aced the exam.
“I was stuck on a question in the math section. I couldn’t figure it out. It was a statistics question. I’m in statistics, and I couldn’t figure it out. When I submitted the test, I realized I knew how to do it. I said, ‘Well, I got that wrong,’” Donn said.
For Donn, who has been in the district since her elementary days at Crestwood, she hopes the score allows her to go to college for free and earn some incredible opportunities at no cost like her older brother, Marshall, has been able to experience. Marshall is a 2021 alumnus of North Little Rock High School and was a National Merit Finalist.
“I have so many teachers I can look back on that have been so helpful to me. I was a shy kid for much of my elementary years. Some of my favorite memories are from the gifted and talented program. I’ve heard people tell me being in a public school you may not get the access to things that other things might get, but I don’t think so. I’ve had a great time [in the North Little Rock School District],” she said.
Donn is unsure of her college plans at the time but will likely lean toward studying science, art, or both.
The ACT is a multiple-choice exam with four sections: English, mathematics, reading, and science. In addition, students can take a writing test, but it is optional. The score range for each of the four sections is 1 through 36. The composite score is the average of the four test scores rounded to the nearest whole number. According to ACT, more than 1.34 million students in the Class of 2022 took the ACT.