Education

Princeton And Stanford Spike Writing Tests For Admission

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Rob Shimshock Education Reporter
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Two elite colleges dropped their requirements for prospective students to submit SAT or ACT essay scores on Thursday.

Princeton University and Stanford University dropped their SAT/ACT mandate for applicants, reported The Washington Post. Brown University is the sole remeaining Ivy League school to require students to submit the essay scores.

While the requirement is gone, Stanford admissions dean Richard Shaw said the school would still “strongly recommend” that 2019 candidates for admission submit ACT or SAT writing tests. The school did not respond immediately to a request to a request for more detailed comment from The Daily Caller News Foundation.

Meanwhile, Princeton now mandates that applicants submit a high school writing sample, preferably from an English or history class.

“With this policy, Princeton aims to alleviate the financial hardship placed on students, including those who have the opportunity to take the test without writing during the school day and for free,” the New Jersey school said in a Thursday statement obtained by WaPo.

Students who opt to take the essay portions of the ACT and SAT need to pay an additional fine of up to $16.50 or $17, respectively.

Almost every Ivy League school has dropped the required ACT and SAT writing sections, but they still mandate that students take the rest of the tests. The University of Chicago became the first top-10 research school to scrap the entire test as a requirement in June. (RELATED: University Of Chicago Scraps SAT/ACT Admission Requirement)

“Because Chicago has long been recognized as an admissions reform leader (e.g. Ted O’Neill and the ‘Uncommon Application’), it is now much more likely that peer national universities will follow suit,” FairTest public education director Bob Schaeffer told The Daily Caller News Foundation regarding the school’s switch. “From a broader ‘movement’ perspective, Chicago’s decision extends test-optional momentum from top-tier liberal arts colleges, where more than half no longer require ACT/SAT scores for all or many applicants, to a broader range of brand-name schools. An accelerated trickle-down effect is likely — FairTest’s internal ‘watch list’ already includes about three dozen schools that we know are considering dropping ACT/SAT scores.”

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