After years of debate over whether to remove standardized testing from the list of college application requirements, many U.S. colleges have made their decision. The global pandemic, which led to the cancellation of many of these tests, was the final push these colleges needed to waive the requirement for applicants to submit scores from the ACT and SAT exams.

On May 21, the University of California Board of Regents decided that requirements for the SAT and ACT tests will be suspended for all California freshman applicants until 2024. The board has stated they will begin to work on creating a new standardized test to replace the SAT and ACT and, if the test is ready by 2025, it will be administered. However, if the test hasn’t been finished or is unusable by then they will continue to waive the SAT and ACT requirement.

Currently, several top schools in the nation have also waived SAT and ACT requirements. These schools include Harvard, Cornell, Princeton, the University of Pennsylvania, Williams and Amherst. 

As of now, College Board, the company that administers the test, has canceled its June 6 SAT. The organization has stated on its website that once it is safe to administer tests they plan on offering weekend tests every month starting in August along with previously scheduled tests.

      Currently, College Board is giving priority registration for the SAT tests scheduled in August, September and October to students in the class of 2020 or 2021 who don’t have SAT scores. Registering for this exam will be open to all students in the near future. Meanwhile, the only ACT test that has been canceled was the one scheduled for April 4. The makeup for this test is on June 13, and it has not yet been canceled. 

In light of all of these changes, many DBHS students who have already taken these standardized tests have mixed reactions about scores no longer being required. Many in the class of 2021 have already paid for and taken these tests prior to the start of the pandemic. 

“I’m rather angry because I wasted a lot of time preparing for the tests. Now that it’s useless I want my hours back,” junior Victoria Wang said. “However, it does feel nice to know there’s one less thing I need to worry about when registering for college.” 

Although several universities will no longer require the SAT/ACT, there are students who have already chosen to apply to colleges that still require these scores. 

“This change didn’t affect my decision, mainly due to the fact that numerous private universities still use the SAT and ACT exams as admissions requirements,” junior Diego Tamayo said. “I’m planning to apply to three private universities, so forgoing the exam wouldn’t favor my chances of being accepted into these specific universities, unfortunately.”