Syracuse University students likely remember the day when they finally submitted their applications to attend SU. After spending hours perfecting essays, researching programs and looking up acceptance rates, they placed their fate in the hands of a selective admissions committee and awaited its judgments. 

Perfectly encapsulating achievements while conveying one’s candidacy to a desired school can be an overwhelming process. Including standardized test scores in college applications heightens that stress. 

SU recently announced its plan to continue a test-optional policy for the 2022 admission cycle, the test-optional plan follows the one implemented for students applying for fall 2021 admission. While SU has extended the new plan into the 2022 admissions cycle, it is not yet permanent.

The university adopted the policy due to the effect of the ongoing pandemic on students’ access to test dates. The efficacy of the test-optional system observed over the last year, however, may point to a future where test scores aren’t necessary for college applications at all. 

Waiving standardized test scores indefinitely may provide a permanent solution to application stress, while working to make SU more accessible to a wider range of applicants. Through its test-optional policy for the 2021 application season, SU aimed to relieve student pressure within the context of the pandemic. Maurice Harris, dean of admissions, shared the reasoning for this decision in an SU News release.

“Test date cancellations and limited capacity make it difficult for students to access SAT and ACT test opportunities. By continuing to make the submission of scores optional, we hope to alleviate some stress for applicants,” she said in the release. 

The pandemic has amplified the stresses of the college application process, but the process was stressful and inequitable even before COVID-19. Standardized tests have a history of misrepresenting academic ability, creating equity issues that intersect between different applicant backgrounds.

By using standardized test scores in college admissions, universities are actively supporting a system that automatically puts certain students above others. To diversify its student body, SU, a predominantly white institution, should have an increased inclination to abolish the use of scores that have historically underrepresented certain racial groups.

White and Asian students in the high school Class of 2020 scored significantly higher on average than Black and Hispanic or Latino students on the math section of the SAT. This is due to a slew of racially and socioeconomically unjust reasons, starting with financial barriers. According to the National Center for Fair and Open Testing, “young people of color, particularly those from low-income communities, have suffered the most” from high-stakes standardized testing in the U.S. 

Part of this issue stems from college “test prep,” often taking the shape of private tutors, extra classes and expensive books that help students prepare for tests. According to a report by the National Association for College Admission Counseling (NACAC), “test prep” is a culprit for driving the wedge between privileged and non-privileged applicants. 

“‘From an access and equity perspective, limited testing and retesting capacity will disparately affect students who are underrepresented, low-income, first-generation, or live in densely populated areas,” the NACAC report reads. 

Sylar Takac, a freshman this year, applied to SU without submitting her test scores. She views standardized testing as an unequal process in determining worthiness. “Not everyone can afford tutoring. Requiring scores only adapts to a specific group of students who can afford to have the best tutoring and therefore will get the best scores,” she said.  

Many students who applied for the fall of 2021 believe that their standardized test scores did not thoroughly or accurately reflect their academic abilities. SU freshman Abigale Nutting found that choosing not to include test scores gave her room to focus on other aspects of her application. 

“I worked really hard on my application, and my test scores weren’t as good as I wanted them to be. It was in part due to the pandemic. I didn’t feel that my scores were needed. I represented myself enough in my essay and by showing how much work I did throughout high school,” she said. 

Though SU’s temporary policy change followed the decisions of some schools, other universities took the opportunity to put long-term test optional plans into place. The NACAC reports, “Among the institutions that made decisions this spring or summer, at the time this report was finalized, 80 were permanent policy changes, 25 specified a two-or three year pilot program, and 213 were specific to the class of 2021.” SU should follow their lead and make this change permanent.

In order to truly build a well-rounded student body, applicants deserve to be judged off of experience and cumulative academic performance. It shouldn’t have to take a pandemic to begin looking at applicants as holistic individuals rather than numbers on a scale. 

As Takac put it, “College is about longevity, hard work and commitment to assignments. Those aspects can’t be determined by one score.” Though only applicants now, future students could become important additions to campus. It’s up to SU to provide fair chances for these students to one day leave long-lasting legacies on the SU community. 

Cara Steves is a freshman magazine and digital news journalism major. Her column appears biweekly. She can be reached at cgsteves@syr.edu.

 

Published on October 18, 2021 at 10:56 pm