U.S. military academies will likely begin accepting scores from the Classic Learning Test (CLT), a relatively recent learning assessment used mainly by private religious schools and homeschoolers, starting with the 2027 admissions cycle.
The CLT, which was developed by the for-profit company Classic Learning Initiatives in 2015 as an alternative to the SAT and ACT, focuses on assessing students on a variety of topics ranging from classical literature and the philosophy of ancient Greece and Rome to sciences such as physics and genetics, as well as history, including “American founding documents.”
According to internal emails obtained by Politico, the nation’s five military service academies, the Military Academy, Naval Academy, Coast Guard Academy, Merchant Marine Academy, and Air Force Academy, will update their admissions websites adding an option to include CLT scores starting on Oct. 1.
Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth previously said on social media that “The CLT is the gold standard, and our academies need to attract the very best.”
Jeremy Wayne Tate, the CLT’s co-founder and CEO, told Politico in a statement: “By allowing young Americans to apply to the U.S. Service Academies with the CLT, these institutions will have the opportunity to welcome students who have taken a standardized test rooted in rigor, logical thinking, and a deep understanding of the classic and historical texts that made America great.”
Priscilla Rodriguez, the College Board’s senior vice president for College Readiness Assessments, said in an interview with The Hill that the CLT has yet to demonstrate reliability in predicting college performance.
Rodriguez noted that “a number of industry-standard analyses, research reports, and third-party verifications that have long existed to make sure tests like the SAT or ACT … test the right things, reliably over time, predict success in college so that colleges can trust the test and students can trust it, too. They can trust that it’s measuring the right things reliably.”
She added, “If the purpose is to decide who gets into college, because we want them to succeed when they get there, does it have the necessary predictive validity to say our scores have a relationship to ultimate college success? Those are two broad areas — industry-standard, long-developed — and it is, again … neither of which have been really adequately or at all published by CLT.”
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