photo by: Kim Callahan/Journal-World

The University of Kansas campus, pictured in September 2021.

The ACT standardized test took a beating during the pandemic as tests were delayed and students put off taking it as many high schools went to a hybrid or remote learning mode.

On Wednesday, members of the Kansas Board of Regents took action to ensure that the ACT and its counterpart the SAT won’t be making a full comeback at the University of Kansas. The board unanimously approved new admission standards that create a straightforward path for students to be admitted to KU even if they have never taken either test.

Beginning with students seeking admission for the summer semester, KU will be allowed to automatically admit students who have not taken either test, as long as the students have at least a 3.25 high school GPA.

“This was driven by the pandemic, but I think people were figuring out quickly that these tests were creating barriers,” KU Chancellor Douglas Girod told Regents at their monthly meeting on Wednesday.

KU was the last Regents university that did not have a test-free option for prospective students.

Girod said that the standardized tests had not proven to be a good predictor of college success. Instead, KU’s data has indicated that high school grade point averages do a better job of predicting whether a student will do well at the university.

Girod said creating a test-free pathway to enter KU “hopefully” will provide a boost in recruiting students to the university, especially as KU continues to try to recruit a racially and ethnically diverse group of students. Education leaders across the country have expressed concerns that the standardized tests create barriers for some demographics of students who don’t have good access to the type of curriculum that the tests highlight.

But KU won’t be abandoning the testing model in its entirety. Rather, KU will now have two paths that guarantee admission for a prospective student. In addition to the 3.25 high school GPA, KU will grant admittance to students who have at least a 2.0 high school GPA and score at least 21 on the ACT.

Both of those paths are significantly different than from KU historically has required. Prior to the pandemic, KU would only guarantee admission under two different scenarios: an ACT score of 21 or higher and high school GPA of at least 3.25; or a score of at least 24 on the ACT and a minimum high school GPA of 3.0.

KU, however, had largely suspended those standards during the pandemic, as many students simply couldn’t take the standardized tests. KU was using a provision in its admittance regulations that allowed a committee to review and accept applicants on a case-by-case basis.

The new regulations will allow KU to again starting using a more defined process to admit students. The Regents had given preliminary approval to the test free option in March, but took formal action on Wednesday to change the admission standards.

In other business, the Regents:

• Approved large increases to the health insurance plan offered to students at state universities. Three classes of students — those studying health sciences, graduate teaching assistants and international students — will see a 7.9% increase in their health insurance premiums for the next school year. However, all other groups of students will see a roughly 30% increase in their premiums for the next year.

The first three groups generally are required to have health insurance, while the fourth group of students aren’t required and are voluntarily purchasing insurance through the universities. Those students have had a large number of claims and were driving up premium costs for the entire system.

On Wednesday, the Regents agreed to restructure the insurance system so those voluntary purchasers are charged a separate rate in an effort to limit the increases to the other users of the health insurance system.

The entire system has about 6,000 students who purchase insurance through the universities. Regents staff estimated that fewer than 500 of those students are in the voluntary category that will see the nearly 30% increase. In addition to changing the rate structure for those voluntary purchasers, the Regents also approved a change that will prohibit those students from buying insurance through the plan to cover their dependents.

• Approved new student housing and dining fees for KU and the other state universities for the next school year. KU’s plan included a 2.5% to 3% increase in housing and dining plans, depending on which dormitory and dining plan a student chooses. Kansas State and Wichita State both held their housing and dining rates steady. KU leaders, however, said a rate increase was needed on the Lawrence campus to keep up with growing maintenance issues and also to account for higher food prices that its dining services division is facing.

• Approved new English proficiency standards for faculty members and other instructors. The new standards provide more specific requirements on the type of English proficiency tests instructors must take to show that they meet the standards for spoken English.