Elite colleges brought back SAT requirements. The UC answer? Hurry up and wait 53%
By Jessica Blough78%
7/16/2026, 11:24:58 PM
BS Summary: This article contains 36 faulty reasoning types, including Hasty Generalization, Appeal to Authority, and False Dilemma, with Negativity Bias as the most egregious example at 19.8% saturation with 174 hits. Analysis detected 2,054 faulty-reasoning hits from 880 analyzed words, generating a BS Score of 51.6% and a BS Rank of 53% (7,967 of 16,693 articles). This article is worse (more manipulative) than 52.30% of the article peer group.
For more than two decades, UC Berkeley geography professor Nathan Sayre has offered a curriculum meant to return students’ grades in a bell curve: the majority in the B and C range, with outliers on either side.
But since 2020, he’s noticed that some students struggle to keep up with his coursework.
He adjusted the difficulty of the class in response, but the results have been disturbing.
Some students fly through the simplified course, while others continue to fail assignments and bomb exams.
“Exam grades in my courses have changed from a bell curve to a U-shape,” he said.
Sayre thinks standardized testing — or rather, prohibiting their use in admissions — is partly to blame.
Like thousands of STEM professors at the university system, he has signed a petition to bring back testing as soon as possible.
The petition argues that too many students lack basic reading comprehension or can’t do middle-school math
The regents voted in May 2020 to make testing optional, citing pandemic disruptions and long-standing equity concerns.
A court order that September, stemming from a lawsuit arguing that the tests discriminated against students with disabilities during the pandemic, forced UC to go further and stop considering scores altogether.
Since then, many selective universities that chose to go test-blind have reversed course; MIT, Stanford, Harvard, and Yale have reinstated standardized-testing requirements.
At one point, UC considered developing its own standardized test, but that plan was scrapped as unfeasible.
This week, faculty members urged the UC Board of Regents to speed up the timeline for reinstating the SAT/ACT requirement by September of this year.
Instead, UC Regents Chair Maria Anguiano said an official recommendation on whether or not to reinstate the tests would come by June 2027, moving up the previous timeline by just a few months.
Days before, the UC admissions board announced that it was scrapping a plan to develop working groups on the testing requirement and report findings to the regents by fall 2027.
“A thorough review of our own admissions policies and standards is overdue,” said Ahmet Palazoglu, chair of the UC Academic Senate, a governing body that includes the admissions board and is leading the review of the requirement.
“Our processes may be perceived by some as slow, but they will be deliberative and inclusive.”
But testing proponents argue the lengthy review itself is a problem.
Students typically begin taking the SAT or ACT about eight months before applying to college and may start preparing even earlier, meaning any regents decision won’t affect applicants for years.
Under the original timeline, the changes would have applied to students seeking admission in 2029; it’s unclear whether the revised schedule changes that.
At the UC schools, the issue has drawn battle lines between the administration, faculty departments, and students.
Proponents of the current system say the SAT and ACT present obstacles for first-generation and minority students, and scrapping them can promote diversity — critical for a system prohibited from applying affirmative action in admissions.
But those who support bringing back the testing requirements say the current system is letting students into classes they’re not prepared for, harming both them and their classmates.
One point has broad agreement: Freshmen scores on exams and in classes, particularly in math, have dropped dramatically since 2020.
But there’s far less agreement on why.
Some point to the pandemic, AI, admissions policies, or some combination of the three.
The debate goes to the core of UC’s mission: Should it be a system of elite institutions built to train experts or an accessible social elevator for a broad swath of Californians?
First-year retention rates and four-year graduation rates are at an all-time high across the universities.
Graduation rates are up 6% since 2018, according to Pam Brown, vice president for institutional research and academic planning for the universities.
Pradeep Sen, a professor in computer and electrical engineering at UC Santa Barbara, said he’s noticed “a sharp decline” in performance since 2022, which has led him to spend more time teaching what he previously expected students to have learned in high school.
“When you have such high variance in a class, it becomes really hard to teach.
Who do you teach for?”
he asked.
With classrooms already grappling with shorter attention spans, pandemic learning loss and AI, Sen said delaying a decision only adds to the challenge.
“The timing of this could not be worse, because it’s pouring more fuel on the fire,” Sen said.
STEM faculty who spoke at the regents meeting were mainly on the side of reinstating the test.
Those arguing against it were largely with educational organizations or nonprofits.
Jessie Ryan, president of the nonprofit The Campaign for College Opportunity, said test-blind admissions are proven to promote diversity.
She criticized the board for being susceptible to anecdotes from professors.
“This feels more politically motivated than data- and evidence-based,” Ryan said.
“Instead of pushing for an expedited path, we should be working in partnership to better understand the root causes.”
She urged the regents and UC faculty to collaborate with K-12 educators and wait until the review of the testing requirement is complete before making final decisions or recommendations.
“Access and excellence can exist together,” she said.
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