Danville Teen Earns Top Score on ACT Exam

By Jane McInnis

A Danville 17-year-old was notified that he earned a perfect score of 36 on the American College Testing (ACT) college placement exam in June. He didn’t know how rare the achievement was until he was given the numbers.

“On average, less than one-tenth of 1 percent of all test takers earn the top-score,” read a letter addressed to Joshua Tan from Jon Whitmore, the CEO of ACT.

Last year, just 781 out of 1.66 million fell into that category.

The De La Salle High School upcoming senior was “through the roof” when he found out how unique a top-score was to earn, according to his mother, Isabelle Tan.

Isabelle was very excited about her son's achievement, but keeps a humble perspective.

“He’s not necessarily the hardest worker, but he picks up things fairly quickly,” she said.

Isabelle doesn’t enforce study times for Josh, and instead lets him manage his own time.

He didn’t specifically prepare for the test, or have any expectations of earning top-score.

This summer, Josh is working as a teacher’s assistant at the University of California in Berkeley. He plays percussion in La Salle High’s marching band, French horn in the school’s  concert band and piano for jazz band.

In addition to Josh's impressive ACT score, he got his SAT scores back recently. His score: 2,390 out of 2400.

Patch will meet up with Josh next week to spotlight his achievements.