Stratford Academy rising senior makes perfect score on ACT

MACON, Georgia (41NBC/WMGT) – What do you get when you mix ‘Dungeons and Dragons’, a percussion player in a marching band, and someone who loves Latin and has a 4.3 GPA? You get a rising senior at Stratford Academy in Macon who made a perfect score on his ACT. 

“AP Physics, AP English 12, let’s see…,” Dylan said, thinking about his full schedule. “AP Government & Politics and AP Calculus BC.”

Sound like a lot? That’s Dylan’s course load for the upcoming fall semester. The 17-year-old calls this a lighter schedule than years before.

“They also really encourage you to challenge yourself and push your limits and that’s something that I’ve really been able to take advantage of here,” Dylan says.

Dylan also took advantage of an ACT prep course at Stratford Academy and a 36 — perfect.

“My mom really helped to foster an environment in our house where we always encourage to learn, always encouraged to be curious to ask questions, and follow our passions,” Dylan says.

His mom, Kim, humbly says her kids put in the work. 

“I can’t take much credit. I think we’re really lucky,” she says. “These kids have worked so hard.”

The single mother says her three kids: Hunter, Dylan, and Emma, have all pushed to excel in the classroom.

“The expectation was you did as well as you could. If you were lucky to be especially gifted then you took advantage of that,” Kim says. 

Friends and family call Dylan a “renaissance man.”

“Mea nomen Dylano,” he says speaking in Latin. “I love to read. My friends and I do a lot of programming. We also play a lot of ‘Dungeons and Dragons.’ For extracurriculars, I do theatre, I play percussion in the marching band.”        

He’s interested in a lot of different things. 

Still, he says he owes all of the credit, and his perfect score, to his family and he wouldn’t have it any other way. 

“This is an accomplishment for all of us. This is something that we’ve all been working towards and I can’t take personal credit for it at all,” Dylan says. 

Dylan is 3rd in his class. He’s narrowed down his list of college choices to five schools that include Dartmouth and Brown where his brother is attending. He adds he could see himself working for NASA, or as a professor. 

He was only a few hundred points from a perfect SAT score as well.