Twins get perfect scores on ACT

PALATINE, Ill. -- Twins from northwest suburban Chicago have both done the near impossible. At the same time.

Kyle and Ryan Jannak-Huang, seniors at Palatine High School in Illinois, have both scored a perfect 36 on their ACT college exams.

Fewer than one tenth of 1 percent of students who take the test achieve perfection, ACT spokeswoman Katie Wacker told the Arlington Heights Daily Herald. Of the nearly 1.85 million members of the 2014 high school graduating class who took the ACT, only 1,407 earned a perfect score.

Kyle said he and his brother learned through years of practice that the ACT is not so much a test of knowledge as a test of reasoning, set against the challenge of a time limit. Ryan said his strategy was to figure out how to breeze through the easier questions quickly, leaving himself time to contemplate the harder questions.

"Being twins, we're able to constantly motivate each other in academics or whatever it may be," Ryan told the Herald. "I guess it's a little bit different for other siblings, because they're different ages."

The twins were competitive piano players through their childhoods, and say it helped them on their tests.

"For me, piano in my childhood was the only thing that was challenging," Ryan said. "It helps to be able to appreciate music now."

Kyle said he'll encourage his own children to play an instrument someday to reap the benefits he's experienced.