USA: Colleges See Major Racial Shifts in Student Enrollment

Of note:

The Supreme Court ruling in 2023 banning race-conscious college admissions led to declines in Black and Latino admissions at highly selective universities. At many other schools, the opposite occurred, according to a new analysis.

Overall, freshman enrollment of underrepresented minority groups increased by 8 percent at public flagship universities. The analysis, by a nonprofit organization, Class Action, concludes that those schools were among institutions that benefited as a result of higher rejection rates for Black and Hispanic students at the nation’s 50 most selective schools.

At those top 50 schools, Black freshman enrollment was down by 27 percent and Latino enrollment down by 10 percent.

The data from Class Action, which works to promote equity in education, was based on 2024 federal enrollment figures released in January covering more than 3,000 colleges and universities.

Data released publicly by a smaller number of schools have hinted that highly selective schools admitted fewer Black and Latino students following the Supreme Court decision, but the report was one of the first efforts to analyze the impact of the decision on enrollment demographics across a broad swath of the nation’s colleges.

While the data covers only freshman enrollment the first year after the Supreme Court decision went into effect, it bolsters the prediction by some education experts that the decision would create a chain of consequences. Highly qualified Black and Latino students, who might have been admitted to the Ivy League and other similar schools before the Supreme Court decision, enrolled in less-selective schools as a result of the decision, potentially leading to a “cascade” of less-qualified minority students enrolling in even less-selective institutions.

Some research suggests that the phenomenon, called a “cascade” effect and identified in California following a statewide ban on affirmative action in 1998, may have long-term effects on employment opportunities and earnings for the students who ended up in the least selective institutions.

The new report concludes that the Supreme Court decision reduced the number of students of color at institutions with the highest graduation rates and largest median incomes after graduation, a result that the authors said could lead to persistent racial inequities in income….

Source: Colleges See Major Racial Shifts in Student Enrollment