I wish Naviance showed if a kid applied test option. When I see my son in comparison to his peers, I can see the test scores, but I have no way of knowing if those scores were submitted. IT would be much better data if T.O. was indicated.
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Agree. Our school also uses Naviance, and you really donât know who submitted scores. At least you can see if they applied ED, EA or RD. I would guess the scores that hit the 50-75% percentile for those colleges were probably submitted. The problem is not knowing the class year on those green checks. Were they before or after the pandemic TO boom? They list the number of students that applied and how many were accepted each of the last few individual years, but I donât know what that means for each student on the graph. Naviance is great for contributing some general information about your schoolâs admission history, but itâs certainly not a definitive tool for predicting acceptance/rejection or deciding on TO or not.
This might be where the guidance counselor can help with TO historical trends for students applying from your school.
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I posted this in a previous thread. We toured 3 highly selective school several
months ago. All of the schools reiterated that they were TO and utilized a holistic approach in their evaluation of student applications. However, at one school, the AO went a little further by asking a rhetorical question. He said that if we know your school very well and if everyone in your school who applies to us sends a test score, and you donât, what do you think we will think is the reason why you didnât send one? No one in the audience asked him to clarify his remark.
My interpretation is that there is no easy answer whether to send a test score. It depends on your demographics, your schoolâs demographics, and what school you are applying to. Of course, it also heavily depends on what test score result was obtained.
Wow - that is a lot of students applying to the same schools!
I understand your guidance counselorâs point, and unfortunately, if that is the standard s/he is using in writing reference letters, you have to follow along to some extent ⊠but this is exactly where I think that the new TO norm at many schools suggests that students make a choice: if they enjoy the tests, and feel that can best represent them, then do it! 
If they would prefer to spend their time doing some other thing that they think better represents them, then do that!
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This cliffhanger is like the season ending episode of Friends.
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I believe BUMD is âon a break.â
Edit: I realize now this might sounds bizarre. I was thinking ala Ross and Rachel, but now see that might be an obscure reference because- I am old. 
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Just our experience:
Which schools one is applying to matters A LOT. Our D is class of '22, currently majoring in mech. engineering at a T10. Though her college is officially TO, their own statistics (or what they care to release) shows that applicants who submitted test scores were significantly more likely to succeed (by something like 60%, I think).
With the resumption of in-person testing, I would not be surprised that T10 AOs will be looking at TO applications with more skeptical eyes.
Seems like there is now considerable guessing as to whether âtest optionalâ really means optional, or whether it means âwe prefer to see test scores, but realize that some applicants may have access issuesâ (similar to when SAT subject tests existed and were ârecommendedâ by some colleges), meaning that a high SES applicant in a high SES school in a region where the SAT and ACT are readily available is expected to have test scores.
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NCAA D1 and D2 no longer require test scores for initial eligibility, but this was a change made in January 2023, according to http://fs.ncaa.org/Docs/eligibility_center/Student_Resources/DI_ReqsFactSheet.pdf .
However, specific colleges or athletic conferences may have test score requirements.
You can see the common data set about the numbers. It seems that at selective schools, the admitted students submitting scores is between 50-60%. More and more kids are choosing not to submit because the scores are getting higher every year! At the end of the day there are only so many students who are scoring a 34 or above.
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Yes, schools differ on this, but the number of even elite schools that are truly test optional seems to be only growing right now, where an applicant even from a privileged community can truly decide not to focus on tests. One of the very lines I used on my daughter: A white female, child of professional parents - they will expect scores. They didnât - at least enough of her schools didnât.
There are still plenty of reasons some students will want to take the exams - see all the great posts above.
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NCAA had made that change (no test scores required for recruited athletes) on an interim basis when the pandemic started, and made it official and permanent this past January. I am not aware of any conferences that require scores, but agree that some coaches at TO schools do require scores of their recruits. And of course, at schools where test scores are required, recruited athletes must have test scores.
But again it comes back to how one defines âselective schools.â Some very selective schools (think UCLA, UC Berkeley, Cal Tech) are test blind, so not to those schools. They are finding other ways to evaluate. And lots of LACs are highly selective and have been TO for years and years. But here on CC (and even more/worse) on Redditâs A2C, it seems like on the whole people are thinking a lot about a fraction of selective schools. So perhaps if you really need to get into one of 20 or 30 schools, having a test is key to set you apart. Or certainly itâs a must at some schools that require it. But really I think kids who are otherwise extremely competitive applicants can choose not to take the test if they feel itâs a burden and not worth the stress. Iâm glad my D23 was able to see this early when it wasnât yet evident to me. I just hope kids who hate taking standardized tests know that thereâs a way forward without it if they so choose. And for kids who ace them easily and donât mind taking them, thatâs great too!
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Yes, this exactly. 
Examples of schools that coaches in my sonâs sport told him he would need test scores:
Johns Hopkins, Northwestern, Dartmouth, West Point
Ones that did not:
Columbia, Yale, Pomona
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Our S23 is graduating from a pretty average rural public HS in PA. He will be the valedictorian, with a 104.3 weighted average, but he only has 3 APs (school offers just 5). Most school-sponsored ECs are poorly developed or non-existent. Heâs a good test-taker and got a 1500 SAT on his second attempt. He knew a good SAT score would get him noticed by some selective schools that might otherwise be underwhelmed by his application. In the end, his score and grades combined got him a tremendous scholarship and admits at some really selective schools (e.g. RD at Denison, Honorâs College at Pitt). I guess Iâm just adding another data point for readersâ consideration. TO has just added another layer of strategic decision-making to this already complex process.
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Agree. And I can see it making sense especially if your ability to add course rigor to your class schedule is limited and your ECs are not impressive. Thereâs a lot that goes into the calculus. I just actually appreciate TO because it really truly should be OPTIONAL.
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This is a scenario with which we are pretty familiar but which isnât well represented in the comments on CC, in my opinion. The idea that people just take 15 AP classes and DE and do exciting and deep ECs is not always available outside very populated areas.
My S23âs very small (graduating with under 20 students in the class), rural, private school offers NO AP classes at all. The courses are good. He is taking Calculus. They just do not teach to the AP curricula nor teach the AP test-taking skills and rubrics which are extremely particular these days. (I have experience teaching one of the AP courses a few times- not at that school.) He took one AP exam in foreign language last summer which we prepared for at home so he could have at least that one 5 score to show on applications. There are very few ECs at the school, and he has only been here junior and senior years, but he was in all the plays and played two varsity sports both years. There are only two other ECs, one of which is music (heâs not musical), and thatâs it. His high ACT score gave another data point to AOs and scholarship committees.
I think sometimes people forget that the standardized tests were partially useful specifically because they showed something about students whose schools were unknown to AOs or worse, were looked down upon by the AOs. We have spent a lot of years in places without many of the opportunities that are supposed to fill out the TO applications in lieu of test scores, so I have sympathy to wanting to at least keep tests optional rather than blind.
PS- CarPayDM, your name cracks me up every time.
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I think the high school counselors havenât caught up to the colleges. Every college we met or spoke to were very adamant that it really was optional, that it was up to the student, and only submit the tests if it helps the application. It worked for my D. She was admitted to all but two schools she applied to, and was accepted to 6 schools in the top100, and a few schools with admissions below 35%. In my daughterâs case, her grades and ECs were strong, but tests scores were just average (at least for her demographic). The only college that required scores was Florida State and she was admitted in spite of her score because the other parts of her application were strong.
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However, calculus* is one of the more standardized college frosh level courses, so if that high school calculus course follows a reasonable syllabus, then it is likely that he can do well on the AP exam if he does well in the course.
*Referring to the one for math-heavy majors that the AP course copies, not the less rigorous one for business majors.
S23 didnât submit his SAT to Wisconsin (admitted and attending) and also didnât submit to Michigan (waitlisted). He was advised not to submit to any school where his score wasnât in the top 25%. He did submit to the schools where his scores were helpful or at least neutral (and was admitted to those schools as well).
As Iâve mentioned elsewhere (and as others have mentioned here) that top 25% score is going to get higher and higher as fewer students submit. I hope they keep the test optional policy. We do feel that the schools meant test optional when they said it.
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