The University of California system stopped requiring SAT or ACT scores in 2020, a move that some faculty warned at the time would make it harder to assess applicants amid high-school grade inflation. The system currently does not collect testing data at all for most of its campuses — a policy it describes as “test free” — meaning admissions committees do not see scores even if students submit them.
The more than 1,100 faculty members who signed a two-page letter last week argue that the removal of the test requirement has coincided with a measurable decline in incoming students’ math preparedness that instructors are now confronting in the classroom. “We now observe preparation gaps so severe that instructors must reteach middle-school mathematics while simultaneously teaching the material students need for sciences, engineering, economics, and other quantitatively demanding fields,” the faculty wrote.
A UC San Diego report from last year documented the scale of the problem. The share of students requiring remediation in elementary and middle-school math before they could enroll in precalculus rose from 0.5% in 2020 — the year the test requirement was dropped — to 8.5% in 2025, a 16-fold increase.
At UC Berkeley, nearly one-third of first-semester calculus students entered with what the faculty called “severe preparation deficits,” according to the letter.
The faculty warned that the trends are beginning to affect California’s economy. “We are already seeing the warning signs: longer pathways through prerequisite material, reduced readiness for advanced coursework, and growing pressure to dilute quantitative rigor,” they wrote. “Left unaddressed, these trends will lead to declining graduation rates, longer time to degree, and reduced completion of STEM majors, with consequences for California’s highly skilled STEM workforce.”
Harry Feder, executive director of FairTest, an organization that advocates against standardized testing, said that more schools were making the exams optional or eliminating them entirely even before the pandemic accelerated the trend. Today, more than 90% of schools do not mandate the exams, Feder said.
Critics have long argued that college-entrance tests such as the SAT and ACT limit opportunity for Black, Hispanic and poor students.
At the same time, several prominent universities have reversed course on test-optional policies in recent years. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology reinstated the SAT requirement in 2022, saying the exam helps determine applicants’ preparedness and identify promising students from disadvantaged backgrounds. Dartmouth College restored the test requirement in 2024.
Yale University followed suit last week, a shift the school announced after four years of test-optional admissions. Yale now requires applicants to submit either an SAT or ACT score. A large majority of its most recent admitted class already had: 90% of Yale’s class of 2029 submitted either an SAT or ACT score.
UC Academic Senate Chair Ahmet Palazoglu said the body is examining UC admission policies and requirements.