That’s the curious part. If you look at all the colleges out there, many have never and will never require an SAT. So these will be great options for many who don’t/won’t take the SAT. Then you have the colleges that consider the SAT but take just about everyone - again another great option for any who don’t/won’t take the SAT. Then you have the elite colleges that require the SAT. These will be great options for all with stronger academic and SAT combinations.
College for all 
It’s not a “false choice” if those are your only options. Yes of course you can oftentimes find both, or all your “requirements” (whatever those may be). The point is if faced with an either/or scenario, which do you choose?
It’s sorta like the websites that rate doctors. One may be all 5 stars with an impeccable bedside manner, which is all well and good if I’m having a wart removed. But if it’s life and death, I really don’t care if the surgeon swears at me like a sailor. Give me the best.
It is a false choice because those are never your only options.
Yes, I know, that wasn’t the point.
Another poster asked the question of whether being smart and competent was worth it if it meant being a jerk at the same time. My answer is “yes”, under a lot of scenarios, it’s a resounding “yes”.
But the point breaks down with the analogy.
Test optional doesn’t mean that colleges will be graduating students who will send you “careening off a cliff.”
As for surgeons, I want a competent and experienced surgeon, but could not care less what they scored on the SAT, or even whether they took it.
Yes, I didn’t think the test optional undergraduate history major would send me LITERALLY over a cliff, but an incompetent mechanic could if my brakes failed due to his negligence.
But even metaphorically, the analogy fails. Test optional does not mean qualification optional.
There is. Unfortunately, I am not certain the rest of the application conveys a student’s character either.
Well, test optional, test blind, test required, only thing we can say for certain is that some well regarded schools claim standardized tests are the single greatest predictor of college-level success. Their words, not mine or anyone else’s. But seems legit, given they are the actual institutions in possession of the actual information on their actual students. Like the line from the movie Tommy Boy about a T-bone steak or something…
There seems to be a notion that the goal of a university is to each a trade or career or a skill. Isnt’ university education more than that???
Agree. Character is what you do when no one is watching. Even on multi-day, face-to-face interviews, candidates can say all the right things, things their prospective employers want to hear, things that paint them in good light. No different than on college apps, on those “tell me about your leadership” or “why us” essays. So easy to fake, to exaggerate, compared to standardized tests.
Care to provide the specific links and quotes where “they” said exactly this? Because this isn’t my recollection.
I recall that some said scores are a greater predictor of academic success than grades alone, but then this (like your analogy) is a false choice that doesn’t reflect how admissions actually works.
Like what?
“ Yale’s research from before and after the pandemic has consistently demonstrated that, among all application components, test scores are the single greatest predictor of a student’s future Yale grades.”
Does that count? Er no?
It counts for Yale. I’m all for Yale doing what Yale thinks is best for Yale.
“The primary goal of universities is to educate students to creatively and constructively understand their world. Creative understanding, in turn, is a prerequisite to the third aim of an undergraduate education: graduating students who can act in a well-informed way to benefit society.”
Not to be contrarian here, but in the world of medicine, “competent” is defined by your doctor performing well on standardized tests—the MCAT to get into med school, and board exams, several of them, throughout their education. We can’t practice otherwise. Could you not care less if your doctor scored OK on those? Not trying to be argumentative. Just wanting to be sure you don’t dismiss the value of testing altogether.
The best surgeons in the world are not always the nicest.
“As part of DeBakey’s training, Meadors and other interns spent a stint working 60 days straight, 24 hours a day in the hospital’s intensive care unit. Interns were given a small cubicle in a converted patient room to sleep in, but spent most of their time overseeing patients in the 55-bed unit.
‘It was brutally hard,’ Meadors said. ‘The sleep deprivation was very difficult. … The longest I ever slept was four hours.’
When one intern who had broken his ankle wanted to leave because it was time to get his foot cast removed, DeBakey refused. He told the intern to get someone to come to the ICU to take it off.”
Don’t get anyone started on mcats, this is ONLY about the SAT, nothing more. Trust me.