{"id":390442,"date":"2026-07-08T11:00:09","date_gmt":"2026-07-08T11:00:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/390442\/"},"modified":"2026-07-08T11:00:09","modified_gmt":"2026-07-08T11:00:09","slug":"uc-might-go-back-to-using-the-sat-and-act-for-admissions-heres-why-that-doesnt-add-up","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/390442\/","title":{"rendered":"UC might go back to using the SAT and ACT for admissions. Here’s why that doesn’t add up"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The University of California Board of Regents is being asked to consider whether to bring back the SAT and ACT for admissions, a debate so hot even New York is weighing in<\/a> on this Golden State dilemma. <\/p>\n

Despite dire warnings from our right-coast friends and thousands (yes, thousands)<\/a> of professors who claim incoming students lack necessary skills, I\u2019m here to present a somewhat contrarian position, based on reality, common sense and one key fact that keeps getting shuffled to the side: California parents pay taxes so their California kids can attend these excellent schools<\/a>, even if they can\u2019t do advanced calculus. <\/p>\n

UC is not Harvard, and was never meant to embody that type of self-perpetuating exclusivity disguised as a meritocracy. As the parent of two (hopefully) college-bound teens, I understand the resentment toward both the UC admission process and the post-pandemic, artificial intelligence mess that plagues our K-12 schools. <\/p>\n

But at its best, this push to immediately bring back these tests is a disservice to both the mission of our public universities and the remaining classes of kids who lost learning during the pandemic. At worst, it is jumping on the misguided and retrograde anti-diversity, anti-inclusion bandwagon being led by the Trump administration \u2014 and pretending we don\u2019t see where this caravan is headed. <\/p>\n

Here\u2019s the common sense: This isn\u2019t a problem of scamming students or lazy teachers, though of course both exist. This is a problem with high schools, and the lingering effects of the pandemic. Bringing back a test solves neither.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor sure, these are systemic structural problems and inequalities,\u201d Michal Kurlaender, the chancellor\u2019s leadership professor of education policy at UC Davis, told me. <\/p>\n

Still, the argument is that we are letting in the \u201cwrong\u201d candidates \u2014 those who lack academic skills that would solve for the derivative of f(x) = 3x\u00b2 + 2x \u2212 5 but who are desirable for other, perhaps invalid, reasons that our current admissions are favoring.<\/p>\n

This narrative was given a rocket-fuel boost when UC math professors released an open letter demanding standardized tests be reinstated to weed out the unprepared students cluttering their classes. That letter has now been signed<\/a> by more than 3,000 UC faculty. <\/p>\n

Shockingly, the letter seems to be pushing for a return to standardized tests by, in effect, arguing that a growing percentage of their students are simply too stupid to succeed, no matter what professors do. <\/p>\n

\u201cUC has finite resources and can help only so many students, and only when the preparation deficits they need to overcome are within reach,\u201d the letter reads. <\/p>\n

These \u201cwrong\u201d candidates are supposedly sneaking through the grueling admissions process with inflated grades and AI cheating (never mind their numerous Advanced Placement test scores, which are largely being ignored in this debate), and what some apparently believe is the foolish decision of administrators to emphasize an admissions process that goes beyond rankings, scores and grades. <\/p>\n

The result of the unwelcome presence of these \u201cwrong\u201d admits in our elite academic halls is world-class professors being forced to teach beneath-them basics, and a diminishing of the reputation of our top schools \u2014 despite the fact that Berkeley was just rated the No. 1 public university in the country<\/a> (UCLA is No. 2) and received a record 133,000 first-year applications in 2026. <\/p>\n

Here\u2019s that reality I mentioned: When we talk about wrong candidates, we are actually largely talking about race and socioeconomics (including the ever-squeezed middle class).<\/p>\n

In California, where the Latino population is more than 40% and growing, our universities have increasingly pushed to serve this demographic and other \u201cfirst-generation\u201d or underrepresented college applicants. We have also significantly increased the number of students our universities accept, from all demographics. <\/p>\n

It is useful to know that standardized testing was eliminated by the regents in a controversial 2020 vote, largely based on the idea that it was discriminating against this broader pool of students \u2014 though the data didn\u2019t actually back that up. <\/p>\n

In fact, a 19-person task force that investigated the issue found the opposite: that the tests were useful predictors of college success and could pluck diamonds in the rough out of otherwise average applications \u2014 when used as one factor among broader admissions criteria. <\/p>\n

Wait, what? <\/p>\n

Then why am I against returning to these tests? Because the part of that report we are ignoring is that it also found that the University of California can do better than the SAT or the ACT. Saul Geiser, a UC Berkeley professor and a top expert on this issue, says the task force report was flawed because it failed to account for factors including family income and parent education. He calls the SAT \u201cantithetical\u201d to the mission of UCs and says that it is an \u201cillusion\u201d to think bringing them back would do anything but hurt diversity. <\/p>\n

\u201cUnlike private Ivy League colleges, public universities must strive to serve all sectors of the state and all segments of the population,\u201d he told me. \u201cThe SAT, with its strong correlation with inherited privilege, is a major barrier to achieving that mission.\u201d<\/p>\n

The task force originally suggested that California create its own, alternative test by 2025 that would go beyond math and English to measure the persistence, resilience and determination that have always been the markers of success, in college and in life. <\/p>\n

The pandemic and costs killed off that project, but our new era of AI has made it more possible than ever. Li Cai, a UCLA professor who was on the task force and who serves as the director of the National Center for Research on Evaluation, Standards, and Student Testing, told me that he supports bringing back standardized testing and that the test-blind decision process is a \u201cfailed\u201d experiment \u2014 even though he voted for it six years ago. <\/p>\n

But he also still supports a test designed by the UC system for the UC system \u2014 a test that could be free, available to take anytime at your school or local library as many times as you want, and that gives continuous feedback so students can better see their weaknesses and prepare.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy vision has not really changed very much,\u201d Cai told me. \u201cA public university, a prominent one like the UC … has almost an obligation to not let the private sector take the charge in terms of intellectual leadership.\u201d <\/p>\n

On top of that hesitancy about the real effects of returning to the SAT is the fact that not all UC professors agree it is impossible for lacking students to catch up. Bj\u00f6rn Birnir is the chair of the Mathematics department at UC Santa Barbara, and one of only two math chairs in the system who did not sign the open letter. <\/p>\n

He told me that Santa Barbara sees the same deficiencies in math, especially in non-math majors, but it has found an effective way to deal with it that doesn\u2019t involve slashing admissions based on test scores. <\/p>\n

When students don\u2019t have the basic skills, they are sent to the nearby community college, often over the summer, to catch up. They usually come back, he said, ready for the rigor he expects. <\/p>\n

\u201cThese problems, they have to be addressed, but you don\u2019t address them by reinstating the SAT,\u201d Birnir said. \u201cJust shutting the door is not really the best solution. We think the best way is to have a path for these students to make up deficiencies.\u201d <\/p>\n

Problem solved.<\/p>\n

Bringing back the SAT may satisfy frustrated professors and parents, but it is a test that can never contend with the complicated reality of our state universities: We want them to be both world-class and a pathway for our imperfect, still-recovering kids to achieve their dreams, even if it involves summer school. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The University of California Board of Regents is being asked to consider whether to bring back the SAT…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":390443,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[1871,14713,7,122294,9,8,65072,157237,77110,22273,138473,4574,28107,1523,5247,157238,29527,1816],"class_list":["post-390442","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-california","tag-act","tag-admission","tag-california","tag-california-board","tag-california-headlines","tag-california-news","tag-california-parent","tag-key-fact","tag-open-letter","tag-problem","tag-sat","tag-student","tag-task-force","tag-test","tag-uc","tag-uc-math-professor","tag-uc-system","tag-university"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/390442","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=390442"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/390442\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/390443"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=390442"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=390442"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=390442"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}