Florida students could soon use DeSantis-backed test to get into college

Florida students seeking admission to the state’s universities must submit an ACT or SAT score with their applications, but they soon could have another test option — though one few of them probably ever heard of.

Florida’s Board of Governors likely will vote Wednesday to make scores from the Classic Learning Test, or CLT, a third option for admissions, meaning students could apply with an ACT, CLT or SAT score.

The new test has been pushed by Gov. Ron DeSantis’ administration and faces criticism from the makers of the SAT, now the most popular college admissions test in Florida.

If the board votes to update its university admissions rule, the change will kick in immediately, and students applying to the state’s 12 public universities this fall could use a score from the CLT — now accepted at fewer than 300 colleges nationwide — to meet Florida’s admissions test requirement.

In May, DeSantis signed into law a new measure that means teenagers also can use CLT scores to qualify for Florida’s popular Bright Futures scholarships.

The Classic Learning Test markets itself as an exam that focuses on the Western tradition and texts and since its debut in 2016 has been used mostly by homeschool students and accepted at mostly Christian colleges.

Florida would be the first state to authorize the CLT as an option to meet standardized test requirements at its public universities.

DeSantis and other GOP leaders in Florida have touted “classical education” like the CLT aims to support, and they have ties to some of the CLT’s board members.

The DeSantis administration also has been fighting with the College Board — the makers of the SAT — about content in its Advanced Placement courses and has made it clear it wants alternatives to that organization’s programs.

The College Board, in turn, has raised questions about the CLT, saying its review of CLT practice tests found the math section too easy, with 25% of the questions below a high school level, according to a statement posted on its website last month.

The organization also said the study done by the CLT to equate CLT scores to scores on the long-established ACT and SAT did not meet “industry standards.” That is the study Florida will rely on to award Bright Futures scholarships and, if the change is approved, to make admission decisions.

“I realize that politics really do intersect with education in all states, but ours might have a little bit more of that interaction than most,” said Jodi Furman, a college counselor in South Florida whose popular Facebook page offers college admissions’ advice to parents across the state.

But Furman said she will ignore the politics and instead consider the CLT a potential benefit for students trying to earn Bright Futures and a spot in a state university, where admissions at top-ranked schools have become increasingly competitive.

“We live in a state that is test required, and not all students do well on all tests,” said Furman, who runs the College Smart Start business and Facebook page of the same name. “I’m always going to advocate for students having additional options. I’m going to welcome new options.”

Though many colleges, including public ones in states across the country, no longer require admissions test scores as part of their applications, Florida does and those tests play a significant role in who gets accepted, especially at the state’s more competitive schools.

But it likely will take time for the CLT to become known, Furman said, and for families to decide they want to spend $59 so their children can take the new test.

Florida provides money for school districts to give college admissions tests to their 11th graders. Starting this year, they can give the CLT in addition to the ACT or SAT, but it also may take time before any districts make that choice.

Orange County Public Schools this school year will use its state money to offer an “ACT School Day” test to its high school juniors. Seminole County Public Schools will use its state funds for an “SAT School Day.”

The CLT says it’s not only for students who received a “classical education,” but its focus on “the greatest and most enduring texts that have informed and shaped society” might be a barrier to those whose schools had a different emphasis.

The CLT tests grammar, English and math. It says two-thirds of its reading and writing passages come from its “author bank,” focused heavily on ancient, medieval and “early modern” (from mid-1400s to early 1800s) writers.

The test is given online and takes about two hours. It can be taken at a school or at home with remote proctoring, the CLT’s website says.

The CLT’s study, released in April, offers a way to link scores on its test to the ACT and SAT, all scored on different scales. That study says, for example, that a 92 on the CLT (top score is 120) equates to a 28 on the ACT (top score is 36) and a 1300 on the SAT (top score is 1600).

That is the study the College Board objected to, saying it did not use enough students’ scores, consider student demographics, control for when in high school students sat for the exam or base its findings on official scores. Instead, the study relied “largely on self-reported SAT scores, and over 20% of scores used in the study were different than the scores colleges had on record,” the College Board said in its statement.

The study used scores from 5,000 students while a recent study equating SAT and ACT scores used nearly 590,000, it added.

“As a result, scoring very well on the CLT may not necessarily indicate an equally high score on the SAT, which is aligned to high school grade levels represented in state standards,” the statement said.

The CLT takes issue with those complaints.

“We don’t find the College Board critiques accurate, and stand by our concordance study that was developed over a number of months,” said Noah Tyler, the CLT’s chief financial officer, in an email. “Technical representatives from all three organizations are meeting to discuss this, and hope all three organizations can collectively come to an agreement.”

A spokeswoman for the ACT said her organization had no comment.

About 87% of Florida’s high school seniors who graduated in 2022 took the SAT while in high school, and about 46% took the ACT, data from both organizations shows.

In June, when a board of governors committee agreed the full board should consider making the CLT an option for admissions, one board member asked about CLT’s study.

“How long has that been researched and what was the validity?” asked Deanna Michael, a professor at the University of South Florida whose term on the board ended July 31.

Christy England, the board’s vice chancellor for academic and student affairs, did not directly answer those questions but said that if the state wanted to authorize the CLT now, it had no choice but to use the study done by the CLT as it was the only one available.

“In working with the Department of Education and trying to implement this as soon as possible, we’ve opted to use the currently available concordance from the Classic Learning folks until such time as an alternate becomes available,” England said.

The board is slated to vote on making the CLT an admissions option when it meets at the University of Florida in Gainesville. The board has received no comments from the public on the issue, according to the agenda for the meeting.

The CLT looks to be expecting approval. Its website already lists seven of Florida’s public universities, including the University of Central Florida and Florida State University, as “partner” colleges.