07/20/2026
The SAT IS Back: What you need to get into the best colleges in 2026
Seven years ago, the University of California assembled a committee to study whether standardized tests actually predict anything. The committee said keep them. So, in typical California fashion, they ignored their own committee and went test blind.
Here's how that worked out.
At UC San Diego, nearly 12% of last fall's freshmen weren't qualified to take pre-calculus. In 2020 that number was 0.5%. A Berkeley English professor put it this way: "After the SAT was dropped, I got students who could not write a sentence." More than 1,500 science and math professors — including the chairs of 60-plus departments — signed a letter asking the university to bring the test back. Another 700 humanities professors signed one of their own. Hundreds of faculty called it an emergency.
The New York Times just ran a very long editorial about all of it. Which, coming from the New York Times, is a little surprising.
Round up the usual suspects. Shocked — shocked! — to find that grade inflation has been going on in here. MIT, every Ivy, the entire University of Florida and Georgia systems have already abandoned test optional, for the boring reason that the SAT and ACT predict how a kid will actually do better than a GPA does. And GPAs have been inflated egregiously for the last 15, 20 years. A high school a couple towns from our office just named 21 valedictorians out of 300-some kids. Every news story said the same thing: wow, they're so smart. They are smart. They're not all valedictorian.
So here's the advice, and it's the same advice regardless of whether your kid is a great test taker or a terrible one: do not PLAN on applying test optional. That is not the same as saying don't apply test optional — there's a difference between applying test optional and getting in test optional. Start prep early. Take a diagnostic first so you're not spinning your wheels on the wrong test. Then plan on sitting for it about three times; past three or four you hit diminishing returns. Whether you submit the score is a case-by-case decision. Whether you prepare is not.
Then Pearl takes the second half: what actually changed on July 1st under the One Big Beautiful Bill Act. Grad PLUS loans are gone. Parents are now capped at $65,000 total per kid — $20,000 in any one year — with no income-driven repayment to fall back on. And one restriction in the bill just got struck down in court, which is good news if you're chasing public service loan forgiveness.
In this episode:
- The NYT editorial and the UC San Diego numbers behind it
- Why MIT, the Ivies, Florida and Georgia all reversed course
- 21 valedictorians, 300 kids, and what grade inflation did to the transcript
- Applying test optional vs. getting in test optional
- How many times your kid should actually sit for the test
- Grad PLUS is gone: the new $100K and $200K lifetime caps
- The $65,000 parent borrowing cap — and who got grandfathered in
- Public service loan forgiveness: the restriction that got struck down
- Why Washington tightened it all: the government was losing 25 cents on every dollar it lent
Pearl's loan work lives at yesterdaysdebt .com — she'll pull apart what you actually owe and what your real options are. If she can't find you savings, you don't pay.
More at LockwoodCollegePrep.com — the stuff you're not going to get from your guidance counselor. Promise.
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