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At the height of the coronavirus pandemic, universities embarked on an experiment: eliminating standardized tests from college admissions. That experiment has, predictably, not worked, and elite universities are retreating.

Just last week, Yale announced that it would once again require applicants to submit SAT or ACT scores, ending a six-year test-flexible policy. The announcement coincidentally came the same week that a group of University of California professors released an open letter — now signed by more than 1,300 people — urging the university to reinstate standardized-test requirements for STEM applicants because of severe math deficiencies among current students.

Yale’s decision means Columbia is the only Ivy League school still test-optional. Furthermore, 80% of schools ranked in the top 10 of the 2026 U.S. News rankings have now reinstated the SAT or ACT, up from just 10% in 2023, when MIT stood alone in leading the reversal.

The pandemic served as a convenient “opportunity” for universities looking to make their applicant pools more racially and ethnically diverse. But several factors are causing the pendulum to swing back.

Elite schools are discovering that they cannot maintain high standards while admitting students who are not prepared to meet them. UC Berkeley professors reported difficulty teaching well-prepared and underprepared students at the same time, “making it increasingly difficult for faculty to teach at the level required for advanced STEM work.”

At UC San Diego, more than 25% of students who had earned 4.0 GPAs in high school math were placed into a course designed to “fill the gaps in elementary & middle school math,” suggesting that high school GPAs are becoming less reliable filters for academic achievement. Professors, especially at selective universities, expect to teach college-level material rather than reteach content that should have been mastered years earlier.

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It is also becoming increasingly difficult for universities to justify test-optional policies when research continues to show the value of standardized tests. Students with higher scores are more likely to earn higher college GPAs than those with lower scores, regardless of socioeconomic status. Dartmouth found admissions officers were forced to rely more heavily on subjective factors like recommendation letters and extracurricular activities when students didn’t submit test scores, which favors wealthier students. Standardized tests can also serve as a useful check on academic preparedness at a time when K–12 grade inflation has reduced the reliability of high school GPAs.

Universities are also trying to regain the trust they lost over the past decade. In a rather frank April 2026 report, Yale acknowledged that “When selective admissions seem so inexplicable … it should come as no surprise that many Americans do not trust the process.” The report urged the university to build trust by embracing a “standard of candor,” making clear that academic achievement is the top priority, and even suggesting that Yale publish a minimum SAT threshold.

Educational institutions are also operating in a different legal and political environment today. The Supreme Court’s ruling against race-conscious admissions has increased the scrutiny of admissions practices, making it more difficult to pursue diversity goals through explicit racial preferences or indirectly through racial proxies. Universities can send a clearer, defensible signal that they highly value academic performance by considering standardized test scores.

Elite universities tend to move in a pack. As more universities reinstate tests, others will find it easier to reconsider policies that at one point seemed politically untouchable. Interestingly, the move away from standardized tests was supposed to be about fairness. But universities seem to be learning that fairness requires transparency and applying consistent standards.

Universities are now relearning facts they never should have ignored. Let’s hope these lessons don’t go in vain.

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Neetu Arnold is a Paulson Policy Analyst at the Manhattan Institute. Follow her on X @neetu_arnold

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The Elite Retreat From Anti-Meritocracy