Admissions to a University is Less About Affirmative Action and More About Who Your Papa is

Here is a quick overview of why legacy admissions are the underlying problem in our elite colleges and not affirmative action.

With affirmative action gone, it is time to revisit the privileged version: legacy admissions.

Although colleges and universities differ in the definition of legacy applicants, a legacy student is someone who has a close family member, normally a parent, who attended the same college and will receive an advantage in admissions at private and elite universities. The use of legacy admissions started in the 1920s, when elite colleges became concerned that spots were being taken by Jews and Catholics, as most elite colleges were dominated by wealthy Protestants, at the time.

Legacy Admission Rates

While universities boast about their attempt to diversify their student body, in the same breath they contradict their narrative by continuing to support legacy admissions. In 2018, Princeton University accepted 5 percent of overall applicants, but for legacy students, the acceptance rate was 30 percent. In a recent discrimination lawsuit against Harvard, filed by three Black and Latino groups - Chica Project, African Community Economic Development of New England, and Greater Boston Latino Network - it states, between 2014 - 2019, donor-related applicants to Harvard were nearly seven times more likely to be accepted than their other admission seekers. Similarly, students whose parents and family members were alumni of the institution were nearly six times more likely to be admitted.

In 2022, Harvard’s overall acceptance rate was 3.2 percent but the average admission rate was 42 percent for donor-related applicants and 34 percent for legacies, according to the Boston Globe and the recent lawsuit.

At other schools, according to a 2011 study, legacy students “had a 45 percent greater chance of admission” compared to other applicants at the top 30 schools across the country.

While the affirmative action strike down was in an attempt to end “discriminatory practices,” it overlooks the 70 percent white students accepted through the donor-related and legacy rules - aligning itself with a discriminatory practice of only admitting white students with advantages and not creating an even playing field.

The Donation Game

The most common justification for legacy admissions is the financial connection. Colleges and universities believe that legacy applicants help bring in alumni donations at a higher rate, although the opposite is true.

“Colleges have defended the legacy preference by saying it’s necessary for fundraising,” says Michael Dannenberg, the director of strategic initiatives for policy at the think tank Education Reform Now. Dannenberg points to a study that tracked alumni giving from 1998 to 2008 at the top 100 American universities, as ranked by U.S. News & World Report. The study found “no statistically significant evidence” that legacy preferences themselves make any given alum more likely to donate. But giving these students higher priority doesn’t seem financially vital: Seven schools tracked in the study did away with legacy preferences and didn’t see any large drop-off in donations, though such a drop-off could conceivably occur over a longer time span. (The Atlantic)

College fundraising, it turns out, is more of an art than a science. “I’m not convinced that anybody could prove to you that those people with legacy admissions donate solely [because of a] legacy admission,” says Mickey Munley, a higher-education consultant who previously worked at Grinnell College in fundraising and public relations.

Sometimes the families of legacy admits donate a bunch of money, he says, and sometimes they don’t. “Fundraisers know how critical relationship building is, and they grasp at anything that will help build, sustain, and grow a relationship,” Munley told me, “whether it has any true impact or not.” (The Atlantic)

The Power of Top College Admissions

According to a New York Time Op-ed, written by Dr. Khan, a professor of sociology and American studies at Princeton University, legacy admissions have unexpected and surprising effects. “Legacy students got a leg up in the admissions process, but they were already on the path to success, just by virtue of being born into privilege. In fact, there’s considerable evidence that going to an elite school like Princeton, as opposed to a less selective college, made no difference to their earnings later in life.” In a 2023 report, from the College and University Professional Association for Human Resources, it states, nearly 70 percent of admissions coordinators and counselors are white. Among chiefs, directors, and heads of admissions, 78 percent are white.

When graduating from a top school, it pays off in massive ways like the affiliation with an illustrious organization, the network of connections to people with “friends in high places” and it acculturates that graduate in the “conventions and etiquette of high-status” settings.

One group, however, got a big economic boost from going to elite schools: poor students, students of color and students whose parents didn’t have a college degree. And that’s because elite colleges connected them to students born into privilege — the very kind of student that legacy preferences admit in such large numbers. (NY Times)

In essence, an elite college experience for students from underprivileged backgrounds can be a transformative experience, unlike the experience for students from privileged backgrounds which leads to a future that is already at their disposal.