New SAT Essay: Top Universities Requiring the Writing Test

The-sat-essayThe New SAT in March 2016 delivered many changes to college bound high school students including:

One change many high schoolers were grateful for was the the dropping of the Essay portion of the exam as a requirement to complete the exam.  Following in the College Board’s footsteps, many Universities also opted to not require it as a part of their application for admissions.

However, the Top Universities definitely did not shy away from continuing the requirement.  Using the Times Higher Education Top US Colleges list for 2016, we examine who does and who does not:

Top Colleges Still Requiring the SAT Essay

Top universities in the United States 2016 by Times Higher Education

USA Rank Position in World University Rankings 2016 University State New SAT Required?
1 1 California Institute of Technology California  YES
2 3 Stanford University California  YES
3 5 Massachusetts Institute of Technology Massachusetts  NO
4 6 Harvard University Massachusetts  YES
5 7 Princeton University New Jersey  YES
6 10 University of Chicago Illinois  NO
7 11 Johns Hopkins University Maryland  NO
8 12 Yale University Connecticut  YES
9 13 University of California, Berkeley California  YES
10 15 Columbia University New York State  NO
11 16 University of California, Los Angeles California  YES
12 17 University of Pennsylvania Pennsylvania  NO
13 18 Cornell University New York State  NO
14 20 Duke University North Carolina  YES
15 21 University of Michigan Michigan  YES
16 22 Carnegie Mellon University Pennsylvania  NO
17 25 Northwestern University Illinois  NO
18 30 New York University New York State  NO
19 32 University of Washington Washington  RECOMMEND
20 36 University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Illinois  NO
=21 =39 University of California, San Diego California YES
=21 =39 University of California, Santa Barbara California  YES
23 41 Georgia Institute of Technology Georgia  RECOMMEND
24 =44 University of California, Davis California  YES
25 46 University of Texas at Austin Texas  YES
26 50 University of Wisconsin-Madison Wisconsin  NO
27 51 Brown University Rhode Island  NO**
28 =60 Washington University in St Louis Missouri  NO
29 63 University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill North Carolina  NO
30 64 Boston University Massachusetts  NO
31 =65 University of Minnesota (TC) Minnesota  YES
32 68 University of Southern California California  NO
33 75 Pennsylvania State University Pennsylvania  NO
34 79 University of Pittsburgh Pennsylvania  NO
35 87 Vanderbilt University Tennessee  NO
=36 =90 Emory University Georgia  YES
=36 =90 Ohio State University Ohio  NO
38 =94 Georgetown University  NO
39 =99 Michigan State University Michigan  RECOMMEND
40 =101 Rice University Texas  NO
41 =104 Dartmouth College New Hampshire YES
42 =106 University of California, Irvine California  YES
43 108 University of Notre Dame Indiana  NO
44 =113 Purdue University Indiana  RECOMMEND
45 117 University of Maryland, College Park Maryland  NO
46 =120 University of Florida Florida  NO
47 =123 Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey New Jersey  RECOMMEND
=48 =127 University of Colorado Boulder Colorado  NO
=48 =127 Tufts University Massachusetts  NO
50 =133 Case Western Reserve University Ohio  NO

The College Board’s List of Colleges which Require or do Not

**We currently require the SAT Reasoning Test and two SAT Subject Tests, or the ACT with the writing component. If you happen to submit the SAT and the ACT, we will consider both. Please note that students applying to Brown’s Class of 2021 and beyond who take the redesigned SAT Reasoning Test will not be required to take the optional writing section, but they still must provide results from two Subject Tests. Students applying to the Class of 2021 and beyond who take the ACT will be strongly encouraged, but NOT required, to include the ACT Writing Section.