Navigating the Choppy Waters of Test Optional Admissions

First, Do No Harm.

“Test Optional” admission has a long and storied history; scores of schools, including a dozen or more in the upper echelons of prestige, have been truly test optional for decades. They understand that not all students, not even all of the brightest, most talented, and most interesting ones, are naturally good standardized test takers. So they say: “if you feel that your scores are a good indication of your ability, then submit them. And if you don’t, don’t.”

With the arrival of COVID-19 in the spring of 2020, SAT and ACT test sites evaporated. Realizing that most students, world-wide, would simply be unable to take the tests, colleges adjusted their admission policies. Some schools suspended the requirement temporarily, others announced a 3-year test optional “experiment,” and others simply jumped on the band wagon. (For more on the background, see my April 2020 entry, “A Crack in the Ivy.”)

Two years later, as prolonged pandemic panic is dissolving into cautious acceptance, and testing centers are, once again, generally widely available, the primary motivation for the surge in test optional is fading. Yet, so far, very few schools have announced retreats. Which leaves families asking questions.

Does “Optional” really mean optional?

The short answer is “yes.” It is painfully easy, and often tempting, to scamper down deep into the conspiracy theory rabbit hole. Neither happiness nor wisdom will be found in those dark recesses, though. Worse, it only reinforces the erroneous and decidedly unhealthy perception that the candidate is entering into an adversarial relationship with the reader. Take test optional at face value. Colleges are actively looking for those “diamonds in the rough” that come in through test optional; it would make no sense, then, to exclude otherwise promising applications just because they lacked scores.

I recall one regular decision applicant to a test optional NESCAC school twenty years ago; he was a good, solid student with good, though not stellar SAT scores. In February, when I was on the phone with the Dean of Admission, she said: “You know, Sandy, he would have been better off if he had asked us not to consider his scores.” Bright red lights started flashing inside my head, so I asked: “Can he do that now?” (Keep in mind, I knew that she was looking at the scores right in front of her.) She said “Sure. He just needs to send me an email.” He did, they admitted him, and he matriculated there.

Colleges that believe in test optional really stand by that philosophy. That said, I have heard deans from schools that jumped on board the test optional train because of COVID say: “I can’t un-see a score.” That just means that students have to exercise some care in deciding which scores to send to which schools.

How do I know when to submit my scores with an application?

Colleges publish their admission statistics, including test scores, and consumers often consider those statistics as an indication of the quality of the institution. So the simple, obvious rule is that if your scores would raise the college’s profile, submit them. Look at the score range of the middle 50% of the admitted students. You want your scores to be at least in the top third or so of that range. For example, if the middle 50% is 1200-1400, the rule of thumb says always submit a score above 1400, never submit anything below 1300, and probably not anything below about 1340. I would counsel a student from a highly disadvantaged background, attending a low-performing public school to submit a 1250, but not a student in our population.

But really, won’t they expect scores from the more privileged applicants?

Jeremiah Quinlan, Dean of Admission at Yale, tackled this one at the Interschool College Night for junior parents a few weeks ago. Essentially, he said that in the absence of scores, they need to rely on other sources of information, but the materials that are supplied by Interschool schools, like transcripts, recommendation letters, and school profiles, are so rich in detail that they can get a clear, accurate impression of a candidate without the scores. “Optional” means optional.

What about the school that appears to admit score submitters at a higher rate than non-submitters?

In most cases, that has nothing to do with scores. Stronger candidates are often the ones with higher scores, and students with higher scores are more likely to report them, so one should expect that in the overall pool, there will be more submitters among the highly qualified applicants than among the weaker ones. Even at test-blind schools, where scores are neither collected nor considered, the admitted students tend to be those with higher scores.

Pandemic considerations aside, test optional is designed to encourage highly qualified applicants who nevertheless might not be particularly good standardized test takers to file applications without fear that an unimpressive score would weaken their candidacy. From a college’s perspective, an added benefit is that it also encourages less qualified applicants, as well. These students are easy to dismiss, yet still contribute to the denominator that lowers the school’s admit rate. It is a win-win for colleges but, with a little thought and guidance, it can also be leveraged to an applicant’s advantage.