Understanding Test-Optional College Admissions

Rarely does a week pass without another well-known college or university making headlines by announcing that it will no longer require applicants to submit standardized test scores.

- Dave Bergman, Ed.d

This movement, known as going “test-optional,” actually began almost 50 years ago at Bowdoin College and has rapidly gained momentum over the last decade. Recently, schools such as George Washington University, James Madison University, Emerson College and the University of Delaware have joined the more than 950 test-optional schools in the U.S.

Colleges, especially those of the highly selective variety, are looking for compelling reasons to accept your student as an applicant. Generally, colleges like having more information, not less.

With this in mind, if your student is not planning to submit SAT or ACT scores to a prospective college, he or she should ask himself or herself, “What other components of my application stand out — grades, essays and/or extracurriculars?” These application materials will be even more heavily scrutinized now that the admissions officers don’t have standardized test scores, which can still provide for meaningful comparisons between your student and the rest of the applicant pool.

Test-Optional vs. Test-Flexible