The argument over reinstating the SAT/ACT as one of the 13 or more dimensions of U.C. holistic admissions requires a broader and, clearer understanding of our equity goals as a state — one that functions in both short-term and long-term policy senses. Properly articulating UC’s equity goals can help us find a way forward that integrates and uses the SAT/ACT to support both institutional readiness assessment and individual student agency, without inequitably functioning as a gatekeeper or filter.
Requiring an SAT score doesn’t have to exclude applicants; it can — and should — serve as what’s called a confirmatory-signal mechanism. What’s a confirmatory signal? It’s information that trained holistic admissions officers weigh alongside everything else in an applicant’s file. What makes a confirmatory signal specifically confirmatory is that it corroborates or complicates another signal in the file (the GPA) rather than standing alone.
Where a confirmatory signal would be most useful to holistic admissions is in the middle of the applicant pool, where GPA alone can be ambiguous.
So what does a holistic admissions officer do when they encounter a mismatch between a high GPA and an uneven set of test scores? That’s where their training kicks in.
A high GPA paired with markedly lower test scores creates a question for the holistic reviewer to investigate: does this applicant have an accurate understanding of their preparation to reach their goal? It is a signal worthy of an admissions officer’s attention. Does it indicate an accurate self-assessment paired with a readiness to remediate? Or does it indicate a gap the student hasn’t recognized yet? In any case, it gives the admissions officer information to probe through essays, counselor context, and other elements that the GPA alone does not surface. Grit, independence, and self-efficacy can outweigh a test score — and they are what holistic reviewers are trained to surface.
Experiencing a steep challenge your first semester when you arrive at college is one thing; experiencing failure on the path to your intended major is another.
The crux of the disagreement boils down to an argument over what “equity” actually means. There are two competing definitions at play, and consequently, each camp is answering a different question while using the exact same word. On one side, the supporters of the current policy are focused on a definition that centers equity of admissions, a short-term measure that is assessed the moment the admissions email goes out. By this definition, the only important measure of success is having a more representative entering class. But on the other side are those who are asking legitimate questions about equity of outcomes — a longer-term measure of whether a student who has been admitted has a reasonable chance of fulfilling their educational goals within four years.
Under the equity-of-outcomes standard, admitting a student to pursue a specific major without ensuring they accurately understand their own strengths and gaps for that major is a failure of equity, even though it might have succeeded by the equity-of-admissions standard.
Experiencing a steep challenge your first semester when you arrive at college is one thing; experiencing failure on the path to your intended major is another.
The defenders of the current system rebut criticism by pointing to flat retention, GPA, and graduation numbers as evidence that there’s no “tradeoff” being made between access and readiness. But retention and GPA numbers mask students being quietly absorbed into less quantitative, non-STEM paths after struggling to fulfill prerequisites in their intended fields. This effect makes the metrics look stable while the longer-term goal — equity of outcomes — may be failing.
Why is this important? Because claiming that “outcomes held steady” is not neutral proof that the current system is working well. It may simply be proof that the readiness gap is being masked by major-switching rather than being addressed.
The sharpest framing of the challenge is not “does the system work or not” but rather, by which definition of success is it being judged, and does that underlying definition track with what actually happens to the student after admission. The published data don’t resolve this cleanly because they were not designed to measure equity of outcomes.
Requiring a standardized test score as a confirmatory signal introduces self-knowledge, cross-validation of GPA during holistic review, and support for near-term and long-term equity goals. It’s a reasonable mechanism that adds missing support for equity of outcomes. It gives both applicants and admissions officers the information they need to ensure both forms of success, rather than just squeezing disadvantaged students through the initial door.
It also reconciles the two definitions rather than forcing the institution to choose just one. The confirmatory signal can still serve equity-of-admissions goals while directly serving equity-of-outcome goals.
One mechanism does three distinct jobs: it sharpens institutional judgment in the ambiguous middle; it gives applicants the self-knowledge they need to begin planning their path; and it closes the gap between the two competing definitions of equity that the current debate treats as mutually exclusive.
