California has discovered a miracle. High school transcripts glow. Straight-A applicants to the University of California have roughly doubled in a decade. And the kids still cannot do the math.
That is not a punchline. It is the state’s operating system.
According to UC data reviewed by the New York Post, students applying to the University of California with a 4.0 or better jumped from 52,989 in 2015 to 103,138 for the class of 2025. The spike sharpened during the COVID years, when classrooms went online and standards went wherever the administration needed them to go. The vast majority of those applicants are California residents.
The report cards say excellence. The placement exams say fifth grade.
State testing does not play along with the fairy tale. On the Smarter Balanced exam for 2024-2025, only 57 percent of California 11th graders met the English standard. Math sat at 30.5 percent. Those numbers ticked up from the 2021-2022 floor of 54.8 percent and 27 percent. They remain worse than before the lockdowns. A diploma and a 4.0 now describe a feeling, not a skill.