Is "Test Optional" really test optional?
By Auden Koetters, Copy Editor
Traditionally, high school juniors mark their second semester calendars with a plethora of activities in preparation for college. While some things never change, like USPS being overrun by college advertisements, COVID-19 has turned an age-old system on its head. The time of nervous mothers shoving unenthused teens into backseats of Toyota Siennas for action-packed college road trips has sadly been put on hold. No longer do juniors form neverending lines outside of University High School early on Saturday mornings, anxiously biting their fingernails as they wait to take an SAT. Restrictions put in place by COVID-19 have caused many standardized tests, including the SAT and ACT, to be cancelled. In an attempt to solve the confusion which arose from these cancellations, many colleges have announced new policies in regards to their testing requirements. A popular solution among schools has been to institute a “test-optional” policy, meaning it is at the students discretion whether to submit test scores or not. However, is “test-optional” really optional? Though, in a literal sense, students do have the option as to whether to submit test scores, the “test-optional” policy only further perpetuates the pre-standing pernicious collegiate admissions institution.
The paramount issue posed by standardized testing in the COVID-era is the difference between “test-optional” and “test-blind”. A school which is “test-optional” continues to accept and consider testing scores from students able to obtain them, whereas a school which is “test-blind” will in no way consider scores during the admissions processes. Some schools, such as UCs and Cal-States, have introduced “test-blind” policies and will no longer be accepting standardized test scores. This differs from many private schools, such as the exalted Ivy leagues, who have chosen to instate “test-optional” policies. Brian Taylor, the director of Ivy Coach, a college counseling firm that helps students prepare their applications to selective colleges, shares his doubt over “test-optional” policies in an interview with the Daily Pennsylvanian (DP), the University of Pennsylvania’s independent student news publication.
“We don't believe test-optional policies are worth the paper they're written on. If one kid has great test scores and one kid has no test scores, all else being equal, the kid with great test scores will win every time over the kid with no test scores. As long as the school allows the submission of the scores, then they're not telling it like it is. They're not really test-optional” Taylor said to the DP.
As expressed by Taylor, “test-optional” policies seek to ostracise students who are unable to submit test scores from the admissions process. Though the policy may have initially been instated to alleviate stress from families, its ramifications far exceed any benefits it may have had. Continuing to consider submitted tests further enables able families to exploit the collegiate admissions institution by resorting to drastic measures in pursuance of their scores. Because only families of higher classes are able to employ such a course of action, and submitting a test score increases one's admissions chances, “test-optional” policies seek to escalate pre-existing divides between members of higher and lower classes in America. Such bias in an admissions decision does not seem fair, for it is not the fault of the student their county won’t allow standardized testing sessions.
Inequitable policies, such as “test-optional”, are not forigen to many collegiate institutions. Even in normal admissions cycles, standardized testing requirements, coupled with their heavy weight in admissions, unfairly discriminate against applicants from lower socioeconomic backgrounds. Only some students have access to tutors and technologies which foster higher scores on standardized tests and, therefore, larger probabilities of admission. Because it is solely members of upper classes who are in a financial position to afford the SAT prep ornamentation, such tests only bolster the classism found at the core of the American education system.
Consider two families. In one family, both the mother and father have full time jobs, and their highschool daughter spends her afternoons watching her two younger siblings. On the other hand, the second family’s mother works only part-time, and the family has multiple nannies to oversee their three children. In this situation, the second family could easily drive their highschooler to Arizona for an SAT, whereas the first family would be unable to. What if the first family lived paycheck to paycheck, and the second owned a fortune 500 corporation? While the second family would have the means to fly their child to a state administering standardized tests, the first would be stranded in their county, powerless over their inability to take a test. Such situations exemplify the deleterious effects of “test-optional” policies, and foment the question of who such policies stand to benefit? One can easily see “test-optional” policies facilitate the embetterment of higher-class individuals while encumbering members of lower classes. For this poignant reason, “test-optional” policies are rather incongruous to their names, as they are neither advantageous to applicants nor optional.