Views from the nation’s press
The Los Angeles Times on bringing back the SAT requirement:
The SAT and ACT are making a small but important comeback after the tests were widely dropped as a requirement for college applications during the pandemic.
Most schools went test-optional, meaning students could submit scores if they wanted but not doing so wouldn’t count against them.
Only a handful of schools have resurrected the testing requirement, but among them are heavyweights in the world of higher education: MIT, Dartmouth and Georgetown. Most recently, the University of Texas at Austin and Brown University joined the list and the University of North Carolina is considering it. Yale also will require standardized test scores, but tests such as Advanced Placement can be used in place of college entrance exams.
Additional competitive schools are likely to join the group, along with schools that aren’t as selective. The University of Tennessee, which accepts 68% of applicants, decided a year and a half ago to bring the tests back.
The tests were criticized long before the pandemic as giving an unfair boost to more affluent students who could afford tutoring. And it’s true that scores are closely correlated with family income. But the pause in testing gave colleges a chance to study the issue more closely. They found that SAT scores were extremely effective at predicting whether students would succeed in college.
No one should be surprised. The University of California convened a panel several years ago to study the issue at length and it reached the same conclusion. The standardized tests were more equitable than grades, the panel said, because grade inflation is more pervasive at affluent schools. Yet most colleges refuse to consider test scores, after bowing to pressure from critics. We hope that the trend toward reinstating the tests in admissions makes university leaders rethink this position.
Making the tests optional was actually counterproductive, Dartmouth, Yale and Brown found. Their applicant pools became less diverse, because lowincome students and students of color were less likely to apply even if they had good test scores, thinking they hadn’t tested well enough . ...
There is nothing inherently evil about the SAT or ACT. It all depends on how they’re used. They can act as a reality check — a student who didn’t get great grades might show a lot of potential in the test scores, and vice versa. And, colleges should consider the scores in context, such as, is this the best score in a generally low-scoring high school? A score might reflect the education at that school, not the student’s aptitude for college work . ...