College Admission and the SAT 2025: What Research Shows
Is the SAT Still Worth It? Ivy League Research Offers Answers
In the wake of 2020’s test-optional wave, the SAT has been called both “the great leveler” and “the enemy of equity.”
Nearly all colleges (including the Ivies) suspended or dropped test requirements during the pandemic, aiming to reduce stress and barriers for applicants. Now that the dust has settled, researchers at Ivy League schools have dug into data on the SAT’sefficacy, fairness, and predictive power. Here’s what their post-2020 studies reveal – and what it means for your child’s college journey.
The SAT’s Predictive Power: Does It Really Measure College Readiness?
One big question is whether the SAT actually predicts success in college. According to new research from a Harvard-based team (Opportunity Insights), the answer is yes – especially at elite schools. They found that SAT/ACT scores have “substantial predictive power for academic success in college”.
In fact, among Ivy-Plus college students between 2017 and 2022, those with top SAT/ACT scores (e.g. a perfect 1600 SAT) earned first-year college GPAs about0.43 points higherthan students with more modest scores around 1200 (keeping high school GPA and other factors equal).
Contrast that with high school grades: surprisingly, a student with a perfect 4.0 high school GPA did only about 0.1 GPA point better in college than a student with a 3.2 GPA – essentially high school GPA did “little to predict” college success.
Grade inflation and varying school standards likely play a role, but it means an A-average from one school might not guarantee success the way a strong SAT score can.In short, at the Ivy-plus level, test scores outshine transcripts as predictors.
These findings aren’t just abstract stats. Yale University’s admissions office conducted its own analysis after four years of test-optional admissions. The result? Yale decided to reinstate testing (with a twist – a new “test-flexible” policy) because their data showed “students with higher [test] scores have been more likely to have higher Yale GPAs,” and that test scores were the single strongest predictor of a student’s performance in Yale courses.
In every predictive model Yale tried, SAT/ACT scores came out on top, more than any other factor.
Princeton researchers looking at the University of California’s policies similarly noted that academic success can be identified in multiple ways. Economist Zachary Bleemer (now at Princeton) studied a “top percent” admissions policy(admitting high-GPA students even if their SATs were low) and found it increased the admission of disadvantaged students – but that was a specific context.
At the Ivies, where almost every applicant has a high GPA, the SAT may offer more differentiation.
Bottom line: Ivy League studies post-2020 suggest the SAT is effective at measuring college academic potential – at least in highly selective environments. As one Brown University-led report put it, test scores “add significant value to the admissions process” by identifying who will thrive academically.
Fairness and Equity: Does the SAT Help or Hurt Certain Students?
The SAT’s value isn’t just about academics – it’s also about fairness. Critics argue that wealthier students have an edge (expensive test prep, better-resourced schools), so a test requirement could shut out talented low-income students. Ivy League researchers delved into this concern, and their findings add nuance to the debate.
First, the bad news: there is a massive score gap by socioeconomic status. A Harvard analysis of national SAT/ACT data found that children from the top 1% of families are 13 times more likely to score 1300+ on the SAT than kids from low-income families.
This gap reflects“the accumulation of unequal opportunities over 18 years”– disparities in school quality, tutoring, and other resources from early childhood onward.
In other words, high scores are much harder to attain for students who grow up with fewer advantages.
Does that mean the SAT itself is biased? Not necessarily, say the Ivy League researchers. Raj Chetty, a Harvard economist, argues that score gaps are a “symptom, not a cause,” of inequality.
In studies at Harvard, Brown, Dartmouth and other Ivies,students from lower-income backgrounds whodomanage to achieve high test scores perform just as well in college as high-scoring students from wealthy backgrounds.
When comparing apples to apples (say, two students who both scored 1400, one rich and one poor), their college grades are “virtually identical” on average.
In this sense, a high score signifies academic readiness regardless of a student’s background – the testitselfisn’t giving an unfair boost to rich kids once they’re in college, beyond what their preparation opportunities enabled beforehand.
However, the opportunity to earn a high score is not evenly distributed. As one student advocate at Brown University noted, “many of the students who can prepare for these tests are also the same students who had proper academic resources and tutoring available throughout their life.” Thus, “these tests still actively screen out lower-income and under-resourced students” who can’t prep in the same way.
In short:gettinga high score is easier if you have money, even if the predictive value of that score is real.
Interestingly, Ivy research also uncovered that some supposedly “neutral” parts of holistic admissions might be less fair than test scores. That Harvard/Brown study from 2023 (the one that made headlines about Ivy-Plus admissions) found that wealthy applicants enjoyed admissions advantages unrelated to test scores. For example, elements like recommendation letters, extracurricular ratings, or legacy status tended to favor higher-income students, even though those factors did not predict better college performance.
In contrast, standardized tests provided an objective yardstick. As one report concluded,“standardized tests, as an objective standard, make college admissions processes fairer to students from all backgrounds.”
The fairness takeaway: The SAT isn’t a magic bullet for equity – far from it, given the big gaps in who scores well. But Ivy League research suggests the test can spotlight talented students from any background in a way that subjective factors might miss. It’s a useful tool when used carefully “in context,” as Dartmouth’s admissions team puts it, meaning they evaluate scores relative to a student’s environment (a 1400 coming from a struggling school may say more about potential than the same score from a top prep school).
Removing the test doesn’t erase inequality; in fact, it might just hide measurable academic strengths behind more opaque parts of the application.
The Test-Optional Experiment: What Happened When Scores Became Optional?
With most colleges going test-optional after 2020, we’ve essentially run a giant experiment: Does dropping the SAT/ACT help or hurt fairness and outcomes? Ivy League schools have now analyzed the data from those test-optional years, and the results are illuminating – and sometimes counterintuitive.
Dartmouth College took a particularly deep dive. Dartmouth went test-optional for the classes entering in 2021–2024, then convened a working group of professors to study the impacts before deciding their future policy. Their finding was that going test-optional had unintended consequences for equity. Under the test-optional policy, “many high-achieving less-advantaged applicants [chose] not to submit scores even when doing so would allow Admissions to identify them as students likely to succeed” at Dartmouth.
In other words,some lower-income or first-gen students whodidexcel on the SAT/ACT opted not to report their scores, perhaps thinking they weren’t high enough, and thus lost a chance to shine. Dartmouth also found that the absence of scores didn’t materially change the makeup of the applicant pool – the income and first-generation status distribution of applicants remained about the same as before.
The immediate effect of test-optional was a spike in total applications (more students apply when a barrier is removed), butnota revolutionary jump in diversity within the admitted class.
Crucially, Dartmouth’s study reaffirmed that submitted test scores were highly predictive of Dartmouth students’ performance, and that including them helped identify “high-achieving applicants who attend high schools for which Dartmouth has less information” – often applicants from under-resourced or unfamiliar schools.
The college concluded that requiring standardized tests“will improve – not detract from – our ability to bring the most promising and diverse students to our campus.”Dartmouth announced it willreinstate the SAT/ACT requirementfor applicants to the Class of 2029 and beyond.
Dartmouth isn’t alone. Yale University similarly decided to revert to a testing requirement (albeit “test-flexible,” accepting AP/IB exams too) after internal analyses. Yale’s institutional research showed that even in the test-optional period, test scores remained extremely useful for admissions predictions, leading Dean of Admissions Jeremiah Quinlan to conclude that more data (when considered thoughtfully) is better than less.
Yale also expressed that a clear requirement is more transparent and might encourageallstudents to put their best foot forward, rather than only those who feel confident in their scores – a stance MIT took as well, citing that tests can help identify strong students from less-privileged backgrounds who might lack other advanced coursework opportunities.
That said, not every college – even within the Ivy League – has reached the same conclusion. Brown, Columbia, and others have extended their test-optional policies for now, watching these developments. There’s also evidence from outside the Ivies that test-optional can boost diversity if implemented differently or in different contexts. A national study in 2023 (published by the American Educational Research Association) looked at 100 private universities and found that test-optional policies did lead to increases in enrolled diversity.
And as mentioned, Princeton’s Zachary Bleemer found that in theUniversity of California system, admitting the top students from each high school (even if their test scores were lower) increased disadvantaged student enrollment without hurting graduation rates.
These outcomes suggest thatthe impact of testing policies can vary by institution. Highly selective Ivies worry that going test-optional might mask academic potential in the admissions process, whereas other colleges see optional testing as a way to cast a wider net and give students a chance who might otherwise self-select out.
In summary, the Ivy League experiment with test-optional admissions taught us that policy changes can have complex effects. For some ultra-selective schools, making tests optional didn’t significantly improve class diversity, and may have even dissuaded certain students from highlighting a strength (a solid test score achieved against the odds).
This has led those schools to bring back required testing, believing it can be used to promote meritocracy and access. Other schools, however, have seen modest gains in diversity by staying test-optional, especially when paired with outreach to applicants who might not think to apply. It’s a nuanced picture – one size may not fit all.
Reading Between the Lines: Flaws and Biases in the Research
It’s important to note that no study is perfect, and each finding comes with caveats:
Elite Sample vs. General Population: Many Ivy League studies focus on Ivy-Plus colleges – a rarefied context where almost every applicant has a high GPA and decent test scores. In this range, it’s easier for SAT/ACT to shine as a differentiator. Research on broader student populations tells a somewhat different story. For example, a 2020 University of Chicago study found high school GPA was actually a stronger predictor of college graduation than ACT scores for a nationwide sample of students.
That study considered a wide range of colleges and students, not just the hyper-selective tier. What does this mean? The SAT’s predictive edge might be most pronounced at colleges that are already cherry-picking academic high performers. In less selective environments, where high school preparation varies widely, a student’s track record (GPA) might say more about their persistence and odds of graduating.
Context matters when interpreting “predictive power.”
Range Restriction and Data Limitations: Even within the Ivy+ data, the range of SAT scores was restricted. At these colleges, very few admitted students score below, say, 1200.
So, the finding that a 1600 correlates to a 0.43 higher GPA than a 1200 is based on relatively thin data at the lower end. Those few sub-1300 students who were admitted might have been special cases (recruited athletes, extraordinary talents, etc.), which could skew the comparison. In short, correlation doesn’t equal absolute destiny– a student with a lower score might outperform expectations, and one with a perfect score might underperform, in part because admissions isn’t random to begin with.
What Counts as Success: Most studies looked at first-year college GPA as the outcome. That’s a useful and immediate metric, but it’s not the only definition of success. Four-year graduation, leadership, campus contributions, and long-term achievements aren’t captured by freshman GPA alone. It’s notable that the Opportunity Insights researchers did check longer-term outcomes (like earnings and grad school placements) and found test scores correlated with those too.
Still, it’s hard to measure qualities like creativity, resilience, or interpersonal skills – things that also matter in college and beyond. A test score won’t tell you who will become a great researcher or entrepreneur; it mostly indicates who can handle academic coursework. Methodologically, there’s a bias toward the measurable – what gets measured (grades, scores) is what gets analyzed, even though those might not tell the whole story of a student.
Potential Biases of the Researchers: It’s worth acknowledging who conducted the research. The Dartmouth study was an internal working group including Dartmouth faculty and admissions staff – while their analysis was data-driven, the institution ultimately decided to require tests again, aligning with their findings. Skeptics might wonder if there was an institutional slant toward justifying that policy. On the other hand, the Opportunity Insights team (Harvard/Brown economists) are external academics with a focus on social mobility; they don’t have a direct stake in college admissions policies, but they do have a particular lens (economics of education). Always consider that subtle biases can creep in, from the questions researchers choose to ask to how results are interpreted in media. For instance, the ACT organization eagerly cited the Ivy-Plus findings to argue that including tests “makes college admissions processes fairer.”
That doesn’t invalidate the research, but it reminds us that stakeholders (testing companies, colleges, advocates on both sides) will highlight the stats that support their stance.
Holistic Admissions is Hard to Quantify: The studies highlighting the predictive power of SAT/ACT sometimes downplay the value of other factors. It’s true that recommendations or extracurricular ratings are subjective and showed little correlation with grades.
But these intangible elements can still matter for building a well-rounded class or identifying non-academic excellence. The “holistic” parts of an application are also where bias or inconsistency can enter (as Harvard’s own admissions lawsuit revealed). So while we have hard numbers for tests vs. GPA, it’s harder to quantify qualities like creativity or community impact. A methodological flaw in strictly numbers-based comparisons is assuming those other qualities don’t matter just because they can’t be plugged into a neat statistical model.
In summary, the Ivy League research is robust and useful, but it’s not the final word. Parents and students should interpret the findings with a critical eye. Remember that each study operates within certain parameters and assumptions. College admissions is a human process at the end of the day, and numbers are only one dimension of a complex picture.
Practical Takeaway for Parents
So what do all these findings mean for your child’s college admissions journey? Here are some key takeaways and advice, informed by the research:
Strong Test Scores Are Still a Plus: If your student can earn a solid SAT or ACT score, it will likely strengthen their application. The data shows high scores correlate with college success at top schools, and admissions officers know this. A great score can validate your child’s academic readiness – and at some Ivies, it might even be expected as testing requirements return. Encourage your child to prepare and do their best if they plan to apply to selective colleges that value these exams.
No Score? Be Strategic in a Test-Optional World: If testing isn’t a strong suit for your child, choose test-optional targets wisely. Keep in mind that at the most competitive schools, most applicants still submit scores and those who don’t tended to have lower college GPAs on average (roughly equivalent to a 1300 SAT scorer).
That doesn’t mean test-optional applicants can’t get in – it just means if your child’s score would have been well below a college’s norm, only then might withholding it help. For match or safety schools, a decent score could tip things in their favor, especially if those colleges have found value in the test. Use test-optional policies as a tool, not a crutch.
Recognize the Role of Resources (and Work to Bridge Gaps): The research highlights that access to preparation is a major driver of high scores.
As a parent, do what you can to bridge that gap. This doesn’t mean you must pay for elite test prep tutors – even ensuring your child has time to practice, free online resources, or a quiet space to study can help. If costly prep isn’t in the cards, encourage your student to focus on rigorous coursework and building strong study habits. Those will pay off both in testing and in college. Also be sure they take the test when ready and retake if it might improve – sometimes one more try (with more practice) can boost their score into a new range.
Keep the Big Picture in Mind: A high SAT score can open doors, but it’s only one part of the application. All the Ivy League schools still emphasize holistic review. That means grades, courses, essays, activities, and recommendations remain crucial. Don’t let testing overshadow the development of your child’s genuine interests and skills. Colleges want to see students who will contribute to campus, persevere through challenges, and inspire those around them. Encourage your child to pursue their passions and cultivate strong relationships with mentors/teachers (for those recommendation letters), even as they prep for tests.
Stay Informed on Policies: The landscape is continuing to evolve. Some Ivies have reactivated test requirements (Dartmouth, Yale, MIT, etc.), while others are still test-optional for now. Check each target school’s current policy and, if possible, the rationale behind it. If a school openly states that tests help them find talented low-income students, and your child is in that boat with a good score, by all means have them submit it. If a school is test-optional and your child’s score is below their middle 50% range, it might be an application to go without. Being adaptable and informed will help you make the best call for each application.
Ultimately, the new Ivy League research underscores that the SAT is neither a useless relic nor a flawless arbiter – it’s a tool. For some students, it can validate their hard-won academic skills (sometimes bringing them to the attention of top colleges).
For others, it may feel like just another hurdle in an already pressure-filled process. As a parent, the practical approach is touse this tool to your child’s advantage where you can: support them in prepping, be strategic in sending scores, and remind them (and yourself) that a test scoredoes not define their worth or potential.
The college admissions journey is about finding a school where your child can thrive. The SAT is one piece of that puzzle. These post-2020 studies give us clearer insight into how that piece fits – indicating that while the SAT can open doors, it works best as part of a holistic picture. Encourage your student to put their best foot forward in every aspect, tests included. With balanced preparation and informed choices, they can navigate the evolving admissions landscape with confidence, knowing the data is on their side. Good luck!
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