Three Republican state senators are pressing the University of California to reinstate SAT and ACT scores in undergraduate admissions, urging the Board of Regents to act "as soon as possible" and warning that six years without the tests has left students under-prepared.

"Please re-instate the SAT or ACT ASAP," wrote the three legislators — Sens. Roger Niello (R-Fair Oaks), Rosilicie Ochoa Bogh (R-Yucaipa) and Steven S. Choi (R-Irvine). Ochoa Bogh is vice chair of the Senate Education Committee and Choi is a member.

Injecting politics into what has so far been a largely academic debate about UC admissions policies, Ochoa Bogh also said in a statement that she plans to introduce legislation next session on testing. Her possible bill's reach is unclear because UC is constitutionally autonomous and admissions decisions rest with the regents.

Read more: UC targets high school course requirements amid SAT debate. What aspiring students need to know

The senators cited a fall 2025 UC San Diego faculty work group paper that found about 1 in 12 incoming UCSD freshmen were testing below high school math standards, a share that the report said grew nearly thirtyfold since 2020.

"The UC system has long been the shining beacon of higher education throughout the world," the senators wrote. "We must do all we can to protect its integrity and high standards."

The Aug. 21 letter was sent to Regents Chair Maria Anguiano, UC President James B. Milliken and Academic Senate Chair Ahmet Palazoglu.

The UC debate over whether to restore SAT and ACT emerged as one of the university's most closely watched issues after more than 3,000 UC faculty signed open letters demanding the exams return. Math and science faculty said first-year students were arriving in UC classrooms unprepared and many needed to learn middle school math concepts. Faculty members in humanities, social sciences and arts have also weighed in, saying that verbal reasoning and writing skills were lacking too.

Regents dropped SAT and ACT requirements in 2020 during the pandemic. Opponents of the exams say the tests are unfair because they correlate to family race and wealth, and point to rising UC graduation rates as evidence the policy has not hurt students.

Those who support the tests counter that GPA is also linked to race and wealth. They point to a 2020 UC Academic Senate task force that concluded that UC's admissions process compensated for score differences among racial and ethnic groups. They add that Ivy Leagues and other elite schools that went test-optional in the pandemic have reversed course.

UC's Academic Senate is already weighing the question.

Read more: UC regents set firm, faster 2027 deadline on whether to bring back SAT admissions requirement

On Aug. 11, Academic Council Chair Palazoglu and Vice Chair Susannah Scott formally commissioned the Board of Admissions and Relations with Schools, or BOARS, to look at the "potential advantages and disadvantages" of standardized tests and review UC's A-G course requirements. BOARS is expected to issue its report on testing by February and on A-G courses by May. Anguiano has asked the UC Academic Senate for a testing recommendation by June 2027.

Gov. Gavin Newsom, an ex officio regent who appoints most of the board, has not taken a position.

"I think it's an important discussion and debate. I'm open to argument, interested in evidence," Newsom said when asked about the debate at an Aug. 19 event in Hayward. "Show me the data. I have feelings about this. There's anecdotes about this. But I want to see the data. And I made that point at the regental level."

The governor said he had discussed the issue with Milliken but did not elaborate. "The data needs to bear out the ultimate determination on this, but again, there's some contra-data that's coming out and suggesting different things," Newsom said.

GOP gubernatorial candidate Steve Hilton and lieutenant governor candidate Gloria Romero, a Republican who is a former Democratic state Senate majority leader, sent regents a joint letter last month calling for reinstatement.

Apart from Newsom, no prominent California Democrat has publicly weighed in on the testing debate.

Sign up for Essential California for news, features and recommendations from the L.A. Times and beyond in your inbox six days a week.

This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.