The college application process is a common experience that, at a university swarming with differences and cultural idiosyncrasies, every student has shouldered. No matter which school or continent they hail from, each student has waded through their own papery swamp of forms, transcripts and exams in order to arrive to their place at NYUAD.

Therefore, it is strange to think of standardized testing — with its monotonous rows of test bubbles and the universal sounds of pencil scribbling and teeth gnashing — as a cause of diversity. Yet despite the general feeling of stress synonymous with college applications, the routes that students have taken to apply to NYUAD remain very different.

According to the NYUAD policy on testing requirements, applicants are able to submit results from a plethora of standardized tests, including the Scholastic Assessment Test, American College Testing, International Baccleaureate or Advanced Placement tests. However, if they wish, students may submit results from national exams specific to their home countries instead or any combination of standardized test scores. These standards are identical to those of the admissions process at NYU, which credits itself as having “one of the most flexible testing policies of any college or university.”

Consequently, at NYUAD, testing backgrounds are often as diverse as the students themselves. Names of different testing systems that students have trudged through — which range from ACT, SAT, IB and A-Levels — are constantly lobbed around, and the abundance of acronyms often dissolve into meaningless jumbles of letters. Amidst all the lengthy tests, students may forget that their own applications to NYUAD could look extremely different from those of their friends.

“I think it's a great model,” said freshman Allen Magnusson of the university’s open-minded testing policy. “Students from around the world have different tests and examination procedures, so it doesn't make sense to force a kid from, I don't know, Vietnam to apply with an SAT score. Here, you submit what best represents your strengths.”

A Colorado native, Magnusson submitted SAT, ACT, and 11 AP subject scores when applying to NYUAD. The SAT and ACT are both American standardized tests that assess students on areas including Critical Reading, Math and Science. The subject matters of these tests are not taught specifically in the typical American curriculum, and over the past few years, an enormous market has emerged for high school students in the United States, offering prep books, tutors and outside classes guaranteeing standardized testing success.

“I knew a lot of kids who had SAT prep books piled from floor to ceiling. It was ridiculous,” said Magnusson, who does not believe in studying for standardized tests. “But for me … I just woke up in the morning, drank a cup of coffee, showed up on site and pounded it out.”

Magnusson also took eleven AP tests. Similar to the IB, the AP involves a yearlong curriculum in which subjects like Psychology, Calculus and Physics are offered. Students take these courses at a higher level than the standard high school curriculum, and are then able to take an optional final exam at the end of the year. Both the grade for the course and the exam, depending on the policy of one’s high school, are submitted to universities.

Magnusson’s experience proves very different from freshman Brenda Odhingo’s application process. Having submitted scores from both the IB and Kenyan national exam, Odhingo dedicated large chunks of time to studying for standardized tests.

“[For the IB], I took two sciences and had to do 60 hours of labs and then do reports on all those labs,” Odhingo said. “So that's two hours writing for every hour of lab you do. And you also have things like a final paper and random essays to write and presentations to do. So you have no life, basically.”

In addition to the IB, Odhingo was required to take the Kenyan national exam, known as the Kenyan Certificate of Secondary Education, which expected a minimum of eight completed subjects.

“I knew I wanted to go abroad, so I thought doing IB would be better because I can't go to the U.K. with only my Kenyan grades,” Odhingo said. “And for the U.S. I thought it would be better just to have something extra.”

Students like Odhingo, who hail from countries with mandatory national exams, often find themselves juggling course material and study hours for both a national exam and an international exam.

Sophomore Yuanmo Hu took the mandatory Chinese national exam in addition to the SAT. Due to the nature of the educational systems in both countries, Hu found interesting differences between the tests.

“Critical Reading was challenging; it was much more difficult than the readings we did in high school,” Hu said. “The Chinese test system is basically reciting everything. Even for courses like politics, you basically recite the entire book.”

For Hu, the application process was complicated by the fact that he had to decide between Chinese universities and studying abroad.

“There's a weird requirement that if you have your transcript sent to an international university, you can't use that transcript to apply to a Chinese university,” said Hu. “If you're rejected from all American universities, you're screwed. We were quite nervous.”

With such a decisive period as the college application process, having a stake in multiple exams can be nerve-wracking.

“It’s quite a lot to take on, doing a whole exam system and then the SATs as well,” said freshman Tessa Ayson, who did the A-Levels in New Zealand and decided to abstain from the SAT. “It’s possible. But it’s not easy, and you have to go outside of your school and take outside lessons, and it just got way too difficult.”

Freshman Lingliang Zhang, who attended the same school as Ayson, underwent both SAT and A-Level testing.

“It was challenging having to independently scout out all the required resources and then study for them, especially as not many people you know are doing the SATs also,” Zhang said.

Sophomore Lex Peel took the Queensland Core Skills test in Australia, which is mandatory for those wishing to apply to Australian universities. The test involved writing and multiple choice sections ranging from general comprehension to logic problems.

Unlike Ayson and Zhang’s experience with the SATs, Peel found that, when studying for the QCS, outside tutoring was not necessary.

“I don't think many students ever tried to get outside tutoring,” Peel said. “The tests were pretty easy.”

The QCS is graded relatively, in which students throughout the nation are compared to each other. Eventually, these students are placed in order depending on their personal Australian Tertiary Admissions Rank. A test that is graded on a national basis, as opposed to globally graded tests like the International Baccalaureate, raises questions about whether or not exams like the QCS are useful when applying abroad.

However, NYUAD and its carefully-trained admissions team continues to accept national scores.

“The NYUAD team is divided by geographic regions when we read applications,” said Lisa Taylor, Assistant Dean of Admissions. “So for example, I read Asia Pacific as one of many things I do … It’s incumbent on me to understand the educational system in each of those countries, what national testing systems indicate in those countries and for me to be able to say, okay ... I understand [what] this score means.”

When questions arise concerning unfamiliar scores or high schools, the admissions team relies on NYU Institute for International Education offices, which are scattered around the world, in order to gain a good sense of the regional context of a student.

“I’ll contact the IIE office in that region and say, this is a new high school for us, how do you find this high school within the local regional context, is it a top high school?” Taylor said. “And they provide a lot of advice.”

However, there are still huge variations in applications due to cultural backgrounds.

Evgeny Zverev, a sophomore from Russia, found that in his schooling system, there was a noticeable lack of emphasis on extracurricular activities and volunteer work — something which universities in the United States and abroad uphold as an integral part of a student’s application.

“[Russian schools] only look at your tests,” Zverev said. “No matter how much voluntary experience you have, or how interesting you are, they're going to look at only your test scores. It doesn't encourage people to care about the well-roundedness of their applications.”

Taylor maintained that the admissions office is careful to take into consideration such cultural variations in secondary schooling.

“What we try not to do is [penalize] students when they were not allowed to participate in things,” Taylor said. “While Americans are often, from birth, shoved into dance recitals and gymnastics and sports and the math club — all those things that are very important but also intrinsic to the American system, and that’s not true for a lot of places. We obviously want to see more extracurriculars, but if you’re not allowed, that’s not necessarily your fault.”