The removal of standardized testing is not the reason for a sudden spike in failures this past year.
The standardized testing changes resulted in a decrease in mathematical preparedness across the board, but outside of CS/EECS it's not very significant in other STEM majors since most students to other math-heavy majors self-select on the basis of being good in math (and took AP math classes in high school).
The big change is that LLMs became widely available 3 years ago, and practicably usable within the last 2 years. FTA, all of the failing students had enrolled in the precursor math sections that allowed for AI use on homeworks and tests; none from the other sections.
The standardized testing changes resulted in a decrease in mathematical preparedness across the board, but outside of CS/EECS it's not very significant in other STEM majors since most students to other math-heavy majors self-select on the basis of being good in math (and took AP math classes in high school).
The big change is that LLMs became widely available 3 years ago, and practicably usable within the last 2 years. FTA, all of the failing students had enrolled in the precursor math sections that allowed for AI use on homeworks and tests; none from the other sections.