The faculty senate met Thursday to discuss the adaptation of the “test-optional” admission standard for incoming WKU students.

The proposed admission standard, as detailed in the proposal sent to the faculty senate by Vice President for Enrollment and Student experience, Ethan Logan, would amend the current WKU application process by no longer requiring students with an unweighted high school GPA of 2.5 or higher to submit test scores.

According to Logan’s proposal, the change would still require students with a high school unweighted GPA lower than 2.5 to achieve a CAI score of 60. CAI scores are calculated by multiplying the GPA by 20, then adding the student’s ACT composite score.

“As an institution, WKU has been reducing the importance of standardized test scores in our recruitment and admission practices,” Logan said in his proposal.

Provost Cheryl Stevens said that the school could still use testing data for other things such as placement.

“This seems to be the way of the future for many universities,” Stevens said.

Rob Hale, Associate Provost for Faculty & Academic Excellence, said that there are other ways to do placement and that other universities in the commonwealth are heading in the “test-optional” direction.

The faculty senate approved the proposal during voting, with 65% of senate members voting yes, 9% voting no and 26% abstaining.

Provost Stevens also gave a brief COVID-19 update, saying that WKU has a few positive cases speculated to be a student returning that are already infected and that no patterns have emerged as of yet.

Stevens also reported a 17.5% increase in incoming freshman and an overall retention rate from last semester of 77.3%.

Digital News Editor Abbey Nutter can be reached at [email protected]. Follow her on Twitter @abbeynutter.