Should colleges and universities require the SAT/ACT again? More than 2,000 colleges and universities remain test-optional or test-free. The debate on testing continues to evolve as new data points emerge.
One recent controversy is the rise of students needing remedial math at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD), as documented in a report from the UCSD Academic Senate. The UC system has used test-free admissions since 2020. Some think the UC admissions policy is setting students up to fail. They argue that without required testing, the UC system lacks the tools that it needs to keep these students out.
As an expert on college admissions and testing policy, I’m well-acquainted with these arguments. They’re basically a rehash of the old mismatch hypothesis, which contends that some students of color are better off attending a “slower track school,” to quote the late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia.
The argument that the UC system is setting students up to fail might be more compelling if it were true. However, analysis of data from the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System indicates that first-to-second year retention at UCSD stayed consistent after the adoption of test-free admissions in 2020. In 2018, when the UC system still required tests, the retention rate was at 94 percent. Ditto for 2023 and 2024. These numbers are notably stable.
Retention is just one data point, and math remediation is another. As noted in the UCSD math report, the number of students needing developmental math rose from less than 1 percent of the first-year class in 2020 to 11.8 percent in 2025. Current UCSD students experienced online learning during a crucial time in their math development. There are other reasons why students fall behind in math. Math proficiency is cumulative, so gaps in skill development can have negative repercussions down the line. Wealthier parents will schlep their kids to Kumon to address the holes. Guess who gets left behind?
It’s counterintuitive, but students with gaps in academic preparation can still succeed at an institution like UCSD. As explained by Princeton University economist Zachary Bleemer: “There’s no advantage to the student to being pushed into a less selective university. Instead, you’re just taking away the advantages that a school like UC San Diego offers them.” Studying the UCs, Bleemer found that students from historically under-resourced backgrounds, including those with lower test scores, experienced better outcomes when they attended more selective institutions. His work and that of others debunk the mismatch hypothesis.
More UCSD students need support in math, so it’s a good thing they’re attending one of the nation’s best-resourced institutions. Indeed, UCSD’s math department mapped out a plan of attack on how they can target students for earlier intervention and support.
Federick Ngo, an associate professor at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas and an expert on developmental education, commented, in regards to UCSD, “The pain points that inevitably come with reform are an opportunity for campus leaders, faculty and staff to come together and devise new ways to support today’s college students.” The UCSD math report reflects pain points in the UC system’s evolution, but they also represent an opportunity to help UCSD grow as an institution.
Unfortunately, not everyone sees it that way. Spurred by the report, U.S. Senator Bill Cassidy announced plans to investigate math instruction at selective institutions. He needs to understand that UCSD is a bad test case for a national referendum on standardized tests or even math placement, given the complex dynamics affecting math instruction at the institution.
Yes, there are many challenges with K-12 math preparation. Accordingly, university departments need to rework their practices to support students, and they should receive the necessary resources. Still, it’s hard to see what returning to required standardized testing would bring. If the goal is to exclude students who still have a very high chance of graduating, then perhaps it’s the right approach. However, if the goal is to advance both excellence and social mobility, the test-free experiment at the UCs actually seems to be going pretty well. Maybe not if you own a test prep company, but that’s another story.
