28 October 2022
Selective Colleges with Low Test Submission Rates
As you evaluate whether or not to submit test scores with your application, consider not only the strength of your score(s), but also the degree to which colleges of interest have embraced students without test scores.
While the colleges themselves have not been particularly forthcoming about the impact of test score submission on admission rate, the latest version of the Common Data Set (CDS) does make it possible to get a sense for the mix of the Fall 2021 entering class that submitted test scores. If 90% of the entering class submitted test scores, applying test-optional may be risky. On the flip side, if 10% of the entering class submitted test scores, you can feel pretty comfortable that applying test-optional won't put your application at risk.
This post focuses on selective, test-optional institutions where a low percentage of the Fall 2021 entering class submitted test scores. In other words, places where you can feel more comfortable applying test-optional.
Note: because the Common Data Set reports the percentage submitting SAT and percentage submitting ACT but NOT the percentage submitting both, we report the results in the form of a range and an index that represents the midpoint of that range. Each school listed has an admit rate of 50 percent or less and an index of 33 percent or lower.
Click on Continue Reading to see the list.
Selective Colleges with Low Test Submission Rates (Class of 2025)
College Kickstart LLC
Institution | Admit Rate | % of Entering Class with Test Scores |
Index |
---|---|---|---|
Trinity College | 38% | 11-16% | 14% |
Connecticut College | 41% | 12-22% | 17% |
Clark University | 48% | 17-22% | 20% |
State University of New York - New Paltz | 46% | 18-22% | 20% |
Loyola Marymount University | 46% | 18-32% | 25% |
University of Rochester | 41% | 22-29% | 26% |
New York University | 13% | 23-32% | 28% |
Hampden-Sydney College | 37% | 19-36% | 28% |
Skidmore College | 31% | 26-37% | 32% |
Howard University | 35% | 27-37% | 32% |
Get our latest data and insights
Give your college plan a boost
Balance list, maximize odds and minimize wasted motion. Current data and personalized recommendations.
Students, learn more Counselors, learn more
Archives
- Your College List (105)
- Early Admission (236)
- Standardized Testing (14)
- Class of 2029 (13)
- Class of 2028 (53)
- Class of 2027 (64)
- Class of 2026 (62)
- Class of 2025 (78)
- Class of 2024 (69)
- Class of 2023 (87)
- Class of 2022 (82)
- Class of 2021 (80)
- Class of 2020 (65)
- Class of 2019 (6)
- Waitlist (10)
- Financial Aid (4)
- College Tour Planner (0)
- Whirlwind Tours (0)
- Essays (9)
- College Kickstart (58)
- Product Announcements (12)
- Perspectives (102)
- College Rankings (28)
- Affordability (12)
- AP Exams (3)
- Miscellaneous (11)
Hot Topics
- Yale
- UC Santa Barbara
- Brown
- Ivy League
- Colby
- Dartmouth
- Stanford
- UC Irvine
- Princeton
- Wesleyan
- Cornell
- Class of 2023
- Early Action
- Notre Dame
- Rice
- Class of 2022
- UCLA
- Vanderbilt
- University of Pennsylvania
- Boston College
- Middlebury
- UC San Diego
- Duke
- UC Davis
- Class of 2021
- MIT
- Pomona
- University of Virginia
- Columbia
- Boston University
- UC Berkeley
- Johns Hopkins
- Claremont McKenna
- Georgia Tech
- Williams
- Emory
- Class of 2024
- Early Decision
- Harvard
- Northwestern