In a move that is as surprising as the sun rising in the morning, Dartmouth has joined MIT and has decided to reinstate the requirement that applicants submit SAT or ACT scores for admission. https://www.npr.org/2024/02/05/1229223433/sat-act-diversity-dartmouth-college-admissions

The pendulum of the test optional farce is finally starting to swing back in the direction of common sense as schools are seeing that accepting students solely on (inflated) grades and unquantifiable holistic measures isn’t helping them correctly identify the most qualified students.

Test Optional – Just Plain Foolish

I’ve always likened test optional admissions as being akin to picking a basketball team without asking the players their height. It’s absurd. After over 10,000 sessions in the past five years, I can tell you, these tests are EXTREMELY ACCURATE at showing who does, and who doesn’t know what they are doing. When a student doesn’t submit their score, they are simply saying, “I don’t really know what I’m doing.”

Test Optional – Falsifies Selectivity

The test optional system has allowed selective colleges to select inferior candidates (perhaps based on ability to pay full tuition, connections, etc…), while appearing more selective than ever by increasing application counts, decreasing admission rates, all while not exposing their true (lower) SAT range.

Test Optional – Helps Inferior Schools Stay Solvent

Inferior schools (essentially daycare centers for young adults) benefit from test optional policies as well. With birth rates declining, most inferior schools see the writing on the wall, and are worried about staying solvent. They will accept anyone who will help them pay to keep the lights on. By accepting students without test scores, it allows them to report only the scores of their few qualified students, and secretly serve as daycare centers for students that learned nearly nothing in high school. Now, the standardized tests are based on a curve, so even the most unprepared students all get about the same score (around 950 on the SAT), so everyone thinks, “At least they know something!” But, that’s not really the case either, these students are simply equivalent to their peers that know nothing. These schools will remain test optional forever, because they are primarily “high school optional” schools anyway.

The Momentum is Changing (Thankfully)

I’m so glad to see that the momentum is changing on this ridiculous scam, and I look forward to the improved transparency that requiring test scores will bring to the incredibly opaque admissions process. If your child’s school is not requiring test scores, I would be gravely concerned about the rigor of the school and the qualifications of the students attending it.