{"id":403717,"date":"2026-07-18T19:11:08","date_gmt":"2026-07-18T19:11:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/403717\/"},"modified":"2026-07-18T19:11:08","modified_gmt":"2026-07-18T19:11:08","slug":"a-new-review-of-the-sat-at-university-of-california-is-coming-by-june-2027","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/403717\/","title":{"rendered":"A new review of the SAT at University of California is coming by June 2027"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u00a0This story<\/a> was originally published by CalMatters. Sign up<\/a> for their newsletters.<\/p>\n

The University of California will still evaluate the role of the SAT in undergraduate admissions, despite media reports indicating that the revered public university system suspended those deliberations.<\/p>\n

The confusion comes at a time when a growing chorus of professors and media commentators are pushing the UC to reinstate the SAT for undergraduate admissions, which the UC Board of Regents removed from the admissions process in 2020. <\/p>\n

That board decision overruled<\/a> the UC Academic Senate\u2019s recommendation that the UC keep its then-policy of relying on the SAT and the ACT. The regents\u2019 vote was unanimous.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The latest whiplash began last month, when the academic senate said it would launch a review of standardized tests in admissions and the high school classes that students must take to be minimally eligible for UC admissions.<\/p>\n

Monday afternoon, several<\/a> news stories<\/a> reported that an academic senate committee that oversees admissions decided to scrap that review.<\/p>\n

However, two key officials at the UC said a new evaluation of the role of standardized testing in admissions is still on the table. One of those officials is the chair of the academic senate, Ahmet Palazoglu.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Academic Senate is not rescinding its commitment to a comprehensive review of standardized testing in admissions,\u201d he wrote in a statement Monday night on the UC Office of the President website<\/a>. He said the senate is merely revising its original timeline for a full review of the admissions process.<\/p>\n

At a Tuesday meeting of the UC Board of Regents, the new board chair, Maria Anguiano, said the academic senate will finish its review by \u201cno later than the end of this academic year,\u201d which means around June 2027.<\/p>\n

That speeds up the original timeline. An academic senate document<\/a> issued last month said its final report and recommendation to the regents would come sometime in fall 2027.<\/p>\n

Palazoglu clarified in an email Tuesday that the June timeline pertains only to the question of standardized tests in admissions. The academic senate will meet July 22 to decide on a separate approach to reviewing the high school courses students must take<\/a> for UC eligibility.\u00a0<\/p>\n

While the academic senate has considerable power at the UC, it cannot unilaterally return the SAT to undergraduate admissions. Only the board of regents can. Procedurally, the board must first hear least one informational item that\u2019s on the agenda and then vote on any proposed policy at a subsequent meeting.<\/p>\n

Students again oppose SAT use<\/p>\n

The UC Student Association sent a letter to the regents<\/a> this week opposing a return to the SAT. The association, which represents 237,000 undergraduate students at the UC, \u201cdoes not believe SAT\/ACT will result in better prepared students.\u201d The letter notes that racial and ethnic diversity at the UC increased after 2020 while the system posted no decline in graduation rates.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe role of public education is to ensure all students can access their right to a robust, quality learning experience, and the UC must not limit the number of students able to enter its halls,\u201d the students wrote.<\/p>\n

Students in 2020 urged the regents to remove standardized tests from admissions. The regents reaffirmed their ban on exams for admissions in 2021<\/a>.<\/p>\n

At the meeting, Anguiano hinted at her discomfort with the current discourse over the role of tests in admissions. \u201cRecent public conversations have focused on admissions and standardized testing, too narrowly, in my opinion,\u201d she said Tuesday.<\/p>\n

Why faculty want the SAT back<\/p>\n

More than 2,000 UC professors in science, technology, engineering and math have signed a petition<\/a> urging the UC to reinstate the SAT or ACT as requirements for undergraduate admissions for STEM majors by fall 2027. Nearly 1,000 additional professors in other disciplines signed a similar letter to fully reinstate the SAT or ACT in the admissions process.<\/p>\n

The petition from STEM professors said high school grades alone are not a sufficient measure of college readiness, pointing to increasing grade inflation and the growing number of students relying on artificial intelligence to complete assignments.\u00a0That means some students aren\u2019t prepared for the rigors of a UC education, they say.<\/p>\n

Mina Aganagic, a physics and math professor at UC Berkeley, spoke Tuesday in favor of returning the SAT. \u201cWithout the SAT, our introductory courses are forced to reteach elementary and middle school material. This wastes opportunities, misallocating resources rather than increasing access,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

But the leader of an influential nonprofit that advocates for increased access to the UC said focusing on the SAT is the wrong move.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is absolutely the wrong solution to an undefined problem,\u201d said Jessie Ryan, president of the Campaign for College Opportunity. \u201cWhat we know, based on the UC Office of the President\u2019s own research, is that since going to test-free (admissions), our retention rates have remained stable and graduation rates have also increased.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

She continued: \u201cIf, in fact, we want to address college preparation, we should be looking not at becoming more selective, but being more supportive to students across the state. Working with our K-12 partners to improve preparation, not slamming the door on thousands of students.\u201d<\/p>\n

Critics of the SAT maintain that the test is unfair to low-income students<\/a>, who are less likely to be able to afford test preparation services to boost their scores.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Standardized tests were just one factor in how campuses decided whom to admit. Other considerations included the quality of courses students take, how that courseload compares to students from the same high school, an applicant\u2019s special talents or achievements and the location of their high school.<\/p>\n

CalMatters<\/a> is a nonpartisan and nonprofit news organization bringing Californians stories that probe, explain and explore solutions to quality of life issues while holding our leaders accountable.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u00a0This story was originally published by CalMatters. Sign up for their newsletters. The University of California will still…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":403718,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[74,76,75,69273,33433,2012,161940],"class_list":["post-403717","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-diego","tag-san-diego","tag-san-diego-headlines","tag-san-diego-news","tag-sats","tag-standardized-testing","tag-university-of-california","tag-university-of-california-regents"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/403717","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=403717"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/403717\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/403718"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=403717"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=403717"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=403717"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}