A task force led by Assistant Vice President for Admissions Jim Rawlins and Executive Vice President for Academic Affairs Janet Woodruff-Borden is recommending that UO move to a test-optional application process beginning for the 2021 freshman class — meaning the application released in August would not require test scores.
This recommendation will be presented to the UO Senate on March 11 and the Board of Trustees on March 16. The final decision on the policy will be made by the Senate on April 8 and a final decision to be made by President Michael Schill and Provost Patrick Phillips immediately following.
The official recommendation report that was distributed to Senate members ahead of Wednesday’s meeting addressed the public discussion about possible inequities when looking at test scores for applicants. It says that students from lower socioeconomic backgrounds and/or minority racial/ethnic groups may be more negatively impacted by standardized tests.
“We want to make sure this [test-optional admissions] doesn’t become something that a privileged student sees as an additional privilege about impacting the chances of admission versus if It might really help some students from backgrounds where test scores might not be as predictive in the first place. We want that student to be more likely to see that ‘University of Oregon wants to consider me,’” Rawlins said at a Senate meeting in February.
According to a study from the College Board that Rawlins and Woodruff-Borden shared with the Senate, the SAT is a far less powerful predictor of academic success for first-year students when compared just GPA. The SAT has a predictive power of .56 and GPA scores a .72 — meaning a student’s high school GPA alone can predict a student’s first-year success at UO with more success than the SAT.
“I can tell you that right now, test scores have very little to do with whether we admit or not,” Rawlins said at the meeting.
If passed by the Senate, President and Provost, UO would join 13 other Oregon institutions and three Pac-12 peers in implementing this test-optional application process. According to Fairtest.org, The National Center for Fair & Open Testing, 1,080 accredited colleges and universities nationwide admit a “substantial” number of students without considering SAT or ACT scores.
“And I can tell you there are several other Pac-12 campuses who are about in the same place as we are, moving fairly rapidly down the tracks, but also trying to be very mindful and thoughtful,” Rawlins said.
This test-optional policy would be applied to applications for the Clark D. Honors College and the Lundquist College of Business Direct Admit program. According to the recommendation report, the new policy would have exceptions, including applicants whose high school curriculum includes study at an unaccredited school, or in the homeschool setting; applicants whose high school record is ungraded (versus pass-fail or portfolio-based); NCAA-recruited athletes; and other students on a case-by-case basis.
