“Every year around this time U.S. News & World Report issues its ranked list of America’s ‘best’ colleges. And every year an inevitable handwringing ensues – among academics, anyway – about what the rankings mean, and whether they’re of any use at all. Pose this question to most professionals in higher education, and you’ll likely get a resounding “no.” The flat numerical scores, which receive the most attention, say little about what makes any college or universitygood or bad. The rankings say less still about the alchemy that makes a school the right ‘fit’ for any given student. On the other hand, many high school seniors (and their parents) take the rankings seriously – which means, in turn, that college admissions officers and marketers need to take them seriously as well. It’s a good bet that Princeton’s current No. 1 status will find its way into the university’s advertising materials posthaste.” …
"The Post asked Trinity for a response to concerns about whether the college would consider ending the test-optional policy. College President Joanne Berger-Sweeney wrote:** “The academic quality of Trinity College’s student body has risen significantly since we went test-optional two years ago.** We have no intention of abandoning our path—our students are simply too good.”
What metric is Trinity College using to measure this academic quality?
US News’ college ranking criteria includes a selectivity portion that is mostly based on test scores (although some other criteria correlate to selectivity as well): https://www.usnews.com/education/best-colleges/articles/ranking-criteria-and-weights
Since test scores are so important to the selectivity portion of the US News ranking criteria, it is not surprising that test optional or tests-do-not-matter-as-much schools may be at a disadvantage in their rankings. But it may not be a surprises that some of those schools that have been climbing the rankings over the years have tuned their admissions processes to emphasize test scores.
Has Wake Forest’s ranking suffered due to its test optional policy?
I’d suggest that it is classist of the US News to “ding” schools for being test-optional. When Skidmore went test-optional a year ago, a dean there (Dean Bates) said, “The tests are so expensive that people who come from lower income families can’t pay for those classes that help them prep for the tests and the books are so expensive to help prep for the tests that I find that it’s unfair.”