Take Two! SAT retaking and college enrollment gaps

Abstract

Only half of SAT- takers retake the exam, with even lower retake rates among low-income students and underrepresented minority (URM) students. We exploit discontinuous jumps in retake probabilities at multiples of 100, driven by left- digit bias, to estimate retaking's causal effects. Retaking substantially improves SAT scores and increases four- year college enrollment rates, particularly for low-income and URM students. Eliminating disparities in retake rates could close up to 10 percent of the income- based gap and up to 7 percent of the race- based gap in four- year college enrollment rates of high school graduates.