For several admissions cycles, families could reasonably assume that test-optional college admissions would remain a defining feature of the post-pandemic landscape. In 2026, that assumption needs qualification. Many colleges still allow applicants to decide whether to submit SAT or ACT scores, but a growing group of selective institutions has restored testing requirements.
For boarding school students, the changing landscape raises a practical question: Should students prioritize standardized testing, or should they concentrate on building the strongest possible academic record?
The answer is not either-or. A rigorous, well-chosen curriculum remains the foundation of college preparation, while testing should be treated strategically. Boarding school students are generally best served by developing sustained academic strength first, then using standardized tests, advanced coursework, and extracurricular commitments to add evidence of readiness.
That approach reflects a broader principle familiar to boarding school families. As Boarding School Review explains in its guide to how boarding schools prepare students for college, preparation extends well beyond one examination or application season.
Test-Optional College Admissions Are Becoming More Complicated
The term "test-optional" can obscure how varied college policies have become.
Common App data illustrate the shift. During the 2024-25 application season, only about 5% of Common App member institutions required standardized test scores, compared with roughly 55% in 2019-20. At the same time, the number of applicants reporting scores increased 12% from the previous season, while the number not reporting scores declined slightly.
By 2026, students also face a highly competitive application environment. The Common App reported continued year-over-year application growth through March 2026, including increases among first-generation students and applicants from below-median-income communities.
Meanwhile, some prominent universities have returned to mandatory testing. Harvard College requires the SAT or ACT, with alternatives permitted in exceptional circumstances involving access. Dartmouth College also requires standardized testing, although its options differ for students attending secondary school outside the United States. Yale University currently requires first-year applicants to submit ACT or SAT results.
The lesson for boarding school students is straightforward: Do not build a college strategy around the assumption that testing will be optional everywhere.
Priority One: Build the Strongest Appropriate Academic Program
A student's transcript remains central because it shows something a single examination cannot: performance over time.
Boarding schools often offer extensive academic choices, including honors classes, Advanced Placement courses, International Baccalaureate programs, independent studies, and specialized electives. The challenge is choosing courses that demonstrate intellectual ambition without creating an unsustainable workload.
Families evaluating those options can begin with Boarding School Review's discussion of what is being taught, which emphasizes looking beyond a school's reputation to examine its curriculum and teaching methods directly.
Students should generally prioritize four qualities in their academic programs:
- Appropriate rigor in core subjects
- Strong and consistent performance
- Progression toward more challenging work
- Courses connected to genuine academic interests
A prospective engineering student, for example, may benefit more from advanced mathematics and physics than from accumulating advanced classes indiscriminately across every department. A student interested in literature or history should not abandon quantitative preparation, but sustained advanced work in writing-intensive disciplines can help establish an academically coherent record.
The objective is not to manufacture the most difficult-looking transcript. It is to demonstrate readiness for demanding college work.
AP, IB and Advanced Courses Still Matter
The changing role of the SAT and ACT does not reduce the importance of advanced secondary school coursework.
AP and IB classes can provide colleges with additional context about academic preparation, particularly when students also sit for externally assessed examinations. Boarding School Review's overview of Advanced Placement academics explains how AP fits within the broader range of curriculum choices available at boarding schools.
The value, however, lies in substantive achievement rather than collecting course labels.
A student taking five advanced courses but struggling significantly may present a less persuasive academic record than a student taking three appropriately challenging courses and performing exceptionally well. Boarding school students should discuss workload, prerequisites, and course sequencing with teachers, advisors, and college counselors before making junior- and senior-year choices.
That planning is particularly important because residential school life also includes athletics, arts, leadership, community responsibilities and other commitments.
Should Boarding School Students Still Take the SAT or ACT?
For most college-bound boarding school students who have reasonable access to testing, taking the SAT or ACT at least once remains a sensible way to preserve options.
A student beginning the process with only test-optional colleges in mind may later add a test-required institution. Admissions policies can also change between ninth grade and senior year.
Students should therefore separate two decisions: whether to take a test and whether to submit a score to a particular test-optional college.
Taking an exam preserves flexibility. Submitting the result is a college-by-college strategic decision.
At a test-required institution, the answer is determined by the college's policy. At a test-optional institution, students should review the institution's current admissions guidance and available score ranges, then discuss whether their results strengthen the academic evidence already present in the application.
Students should verify policies directly before applying. The admissions landscape is too fluid to rely on information remembered from an older sibling's application process.
Curriculum Should Not Become Test Preparation
One potential mistake is allowing standardized testing to dominate the boarding school experience.
SAT or ACT preparation has a defined purpose. Academic coursework develops skills that extend considerably further, including analytical writing, quantitative reasoning, research, discussion, laboratory practice, and sustained independent work.
Those abilities matter both in admissions and after enrollment.
Test preparation should therefore fit around the academic program rather than replace it. A reasonable strategy might include diagnostic testing, targeted preparation in weaker areas, and a limited number of official test dates. Endless retesting can consume time that might be better invested in coursework or meaningful activities.
This distinction reflects a central strength of boarding education described in Boarding School Review's guidance on choosing and comparing boarding schools: families should examine curriculum depth, advanced coursework, faculty resources and college counseling rather than relying on a single measure of academic quality.
Extracurricular Depth Matters More Than Filling a Résumé
Academic rigor should remain the first priority, but students should not interpret that advice as an instruction to spend every available hour studying.
Boarding schools provide an unusual environment for sustained extracurricular engagement. Athletics, theater, music, publications, student government, community service, research, and residential leadership can become significant parts of a student's education.
The strongest choices usually reflect depth rather than quantity.
Three years of increasingly responsible involvement in a student newspaper, laboratory project, or community organization can reveal more about a student than membership in a dozen unrelated clubs. The same principle applies to athletics and the arts, where sustained participation can demonstrate discipline, collaboration, and growth.
Students should ask: What do I care enough about to continue doing when no one is counting activities?
That question is more useful than trying to predict which extracurricular activity an admissions officer supposedly wants to see.
College Counseling Should Shape the Strategy Early
One of the most valuable resources available at many boarding schools is individualized college counseling.
Counselors can help students connect curriculum decisions with realistic college goals before senior year. They can identify whether a student's intended college list contains test-required, test-flexible or test-optional institutions, and help determine an appropriate testing timeline.
That work should begin early enough to influence course selection.
Counselors can also provide essential context. A college admissions office reads a transcript in relation to the opportunities available at the student's school. A counselor can explain curricular structures, unusual course sequences, grading practices, and the significance of advanced programs.
For families, this makes the quality of college counseling worth investigating before enrollment, not simply when applications begin.
A Practical Priority Order for Boarding School Students
Rather than viewing grades, curriculum, testing, and extracurricular activities as competing pieces, students can organize them in a practical sequence.
| Priority | Main Goal |
|---|---|
| Curriculum | Choose appropriately rigorous courses |
| Academic performance | Build consistent, strong grades |
| Intellectual development | Strengthen writing, analysis, research, and quantitative skills |
| Testing | Preserve options and meet individual college requirements |
| Extracurriculars | Pursue sustained interests and meaningful responsibility |
| College counseling | Review strategy as policies and goals change |
The order matters. An impressive SAT score is unlikely to compensate fully for years of underchallenging coursework or inconsistent academic performance. Conversely, an excellent transcript does not eliminate the need to understand testing requirements at every college on a student's list.
The Bottom Line on Test-Optional College Admissions
Test-optional college admissions have not made standardized testing irrelevant, nor has the return of testing requirements made the curriculum less important.
For boarding school students, the strongest strategy in 2026 is to protect flexibility while keeping academic development at the center of high school planning. Choose challenging courses thoughtfully. Perform consistently. Develop genuine academic interests. Take standardized testing seriously enough to preserve college options, but not so seriously that preparation displaces the education the tests are intended to help measure.
The current admissions landscape may continue to change. A strong boarding school curriculum, however, gives students something more durable than a strategy built around any single admissions policy: evidence that they are prepared to do demanding work when they arrive on a college campus.
