Yale to Return to Standardized Test Requirement

Yale University announced this week that it’s bringing back the requirement to submit standardized test scores for admissions beginning in the fall of 2025.

However, while the Ivy League college is scrapping the COVID-era test-optional policy of the past four years, Yale is expanding the types of test scores that can be considered for admission. Prospective students can now submit Advanced Placement or International Baccalaureate results in lieu of ACT and/or SAT scores in what Yale calls a test-flexible policy.

Yale becomes the second Ivy League school to reinstate test scores as a requirement, joining Dartmouth. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology reinstated the requirement in 2022.

“No exam can demonstrate every student’s college readiness or perfectly predict future performance,” the school wrote in its Thursday announcement. “Yale has not, does not, and will never rely on testing alone to assess student preparedness. We read applications holistically, using all the information available to paint a picture of a student’s strengths and potential to contribute to a college community. An application is like a jigsaw puzzle: the picture is not complete without all its pieces.”

Yale Dean of Undergraduate Admissions Jeremiah Quinlan said, “Test scores are not the core of our review process, but they are useful.”

But Quinlan added, “Simply put, students with higher scores have been more likely to have higher Yale GPAs, and test scores are the single greatest predictor of a student’s performance in Yale courses in every model we have constructed.”

According to Fair Test, an organization that is against standardized testing considerations, 1,825 of the 2,330 accredited bachelor-degree institutions in the U.S. in 2022 were ACT-SAT optional or score-free schools.

Fair Test argues that standardized scores hurt the chances of lower-income and minority students, something Dartmouth found to be the opposite. Dartmouth found that hundreds of students of lower socioeconomic backgrounds declined to submit their SAT scores in the test-optional phase despite scores in the 1,400s, out of fear they fell below the perfect 1,600, The New York Times reported.