UC professors warn math gaps demand SAT restart by 2027

UC professors – More than 600 University of California faculty members, led by UC Berkeley mathematicians, are urging UC leaders to reinstate SAT or ACT testing for science and engineering applicants starting in fall 2027. They argue that six years without standardized admiss

For the third spring in a row, UC Berkeley math professor Zvezda Stankova said the class felt like it was falling apart before the final grades were even in.

She described her nearly 30 years of teaching as suddenly turning on a dime—during a challenging spring 2023 calculus II class—when “the bottom was taken out.” Stankova said roughly 25 to 30% of students in the course were “just not prepared,” and that there was “nothing you could do for them.”

That experience is part of the push behind an open letter from more than 600 University of California faculty members. led by mathematicians at UC Berkeley. calling on the system to reinstate standardized testing for science. technology. engineering and mathematics applicants. The letter asks that UC require SAT or ACT exams beginning in fall 2027 and that STEM faculty receive formal oversight of readiness standards in their majors.

“We now observe preparation gaps so severe that instructors must reteach middle-school mathematics while simultaneously teaching the material students need for sciences, engineering, economics, and other quantitatively demanding fields,” the faculty wrote.

The letter arrives days before the UC Academic Senate’s Board of Admissions and Relations with Schools is scheduled to discuss system-wide admissions changes—one of the early steps that could lead to UC bringing back standardized tests across its massive public university system.

The test-free admissions experiment under strain

UC’s current approach took shape after a May 2020 decision. Regents unanimously voted to suspend SAT and ACT testing requirements and eliminate them entirely by 2025. Board members said the tests were biased against students of color and those from lower-income families. including students who did not have access to prep courses.

At the time, some praised the vote as a bold equity expansion. But the decision ran against the UC Academic Senate’s own Standardized Testing Task Force. which argued that using test scores could actually boost admission rates for students from disadvantaged backgrounds and school districts. That task force report also found that test scores are a better predictor of college performance than high school grades. though UC’s admissions weighting relied more heavily on grades.

Then a California state court judge stepped in. In 2020, the court issued an injunction in a lawsuit brought by students, forcing UC to stop using the scores earlier than planned.

The pandemic widened the testing pause even further. Many institutions across the country suspended admissions testing requirements during COVID-19, including some of the nation’s most prestigious schools. The requirement has since largely returned at elite universities.

Harvard, Brown, Dartmouth, the University of Pennsylvania, Stanford and Caltech each restored standardized testing requirements for applicants in 2024 or 2025.

Not all schools moved in lockstep. USC is test-optional and scores are considered as part of holistic review. but students are not penalized if they do not submit them. UC’s policy—and California State University’s—still allows applicants to submit scores for course placement purposes. but only after admissions decisions have been made.

What the faculty says the admissions system is missing

The open letter makes a straightforward claim: without standardized testing, professors can’t reliably tell whether students can handle college-level math.

The faculty point to their own diagnostic evidence at UC Berkeley. Over three years—from fall 2021 to fall 2023—the letter says at least 20% of Berkeley first-semester calculus students who took a diagnostic exam showed deficits. The professors also draw a direct analogy. writing that “Basic mathematical fluency is analogous to literacy” and that without it. “success in university-level STEM becomes structurally unattainable.”.

In November, UC San Diego’s Academic Senate work group report documented another pattern that faculty say supports their argument. The report described a roughly thirty-fold increase between 2020 and 2025 in incoming first-year students whose math skills tested below high school level. It said 70% of those students fell below middle school levels. and work group members urged a “systemwide reexamination of standardized testing” after other peer institutions took similar steps.

Stankova said the decision to speak out publicly was not theoretical. She said her colleagues were bracing for backlash. “Our letter is going to be attacked from all sides,” she said.

But Stankova also pushed back on critics who argue tests would narrow access. She said SAT pushback misses the key issue for her: whether admitting students without appropriate academic preparation risks them failing out later.

“I don’t see SAT hurting diversity. I actually see it helping it, because if you have right now the lack of SATs hurting the underrepresented minorities, you give them a ticket, an entrance ticket to a great university system, like UC, only that they fail. How is that diversity?” Stankova said.

Where UC leaders say the conversation is headed

UC leadership has not formally endorsed the faculty letter on testing. Still, system leaders said they are listening to the underlying concerns.

Rachel Zaentz, a UC spokesperson, said in a statement that the system “will continue to focus on strengthening instruction, collaboration and support” for math readiness in partnership with K-12 and higher education institutions.

Ahmet Palazoglu, chair of the UC systemwide Academic Senate, said he has heard “concerns raised by UC faculty about student preparedness for undergraduate study,” and called on the system-wide admissions board to address “timely topics tied to students’ college readiness and UC’s admission process.”

Palazoglu said the board is “in the process of proposing a roadmap of policy work and partnership building with other state and K-12 education leaders in the next academic year and beyond.”

Not everyone agrees the fix should be standardized tests.

A September 2025 report from Saul Geiser of the UC Berkeley Center for Studies in Higher Education and a former senior UC admissions official argued that the SAT is “a poor fit for America’s public universities.” Geiser said high school GPA outperforms the SAT in predicting first-year student success once income and race are controlled. He also argued that ranking applicants by SAT scores ends up disadvantaging high-achieving low-income, first-generation and underrepresented minorities.

The tension inside UC is now setting the terms for the system’s next decision—one shaped by competing views of what helps students get in, and what helps them succeed once they arrive.

The timeline the Senate is working toward

Any change to UC admissions requirements must move through the Academic Senate admissions board committee before going to the Board of Regents.

Minutes from the admissions board’s March 6 meeting show members signaled tentative interest in eventually requiring 11th-grade Smarter Balanced assessment scores for California residents and SAT or ACT scores for nonresidents.

The board plans to submit an initial draft by Sunday and a “final road map” by June 30.

How prepared are students statewide, and why it matters here

California’s own testing data complicate the picture the faculty letter argues from.

Statewide. students are about a quarter-year in instruction behind where they were prior to the start of the COVID-19 pandemic in March 2020. The letter does not quantify the admissions impact directly. but the state data used in the broader debate translate that quarter-year to about 45 school days—or roughly nine weeks of the school year.

In math, the state’s students are described as having 37.3% meeting math learning standards in the grades that are tested. For 11th grade—the grade most relevant to college readiness—the rate is 30.5% meeting or exceeding math learning standards. Of those. nearly half exceeded the standard. marking them as likely to be the best prepared for a college STEM major.

Taken together, the faculty message presses a particular urgency: if readiness is slipping and admissions don’t reliably identify who needs academic support earlier, professors say they are forced to cover gaps that should have been addressed before students ever reach college calculus.

For UC, the coming Senate discussion is likely to decide whether the system leans more heavily on standardized testing again—or doubles down on a readiness strategy without it.

This open letter. and the classroom stories behind it. arrive with a stark warning from faculty about what happens when students reach college-level material without the math fluency professors say is now missing. And with the board’s draft deadlines looming. UC is headed into a moment where the debate is no longer abstract—it’s about who gets admitted. what they’re able to do once they’re there. and how quickly the system decides to adjust.

University of California UC faculty SAT ACT STEM admissions math readiness UC Academic Senate Board of Regents equity standardized testing