Harvard challenged over legacy admissions

[VOSS]

Quote

It’s been called affirmative action for the rich: Harvard’s special admissions treatment for students whose parents are alumni, or whose relatives donated money. And in a complaint filed on Monday, three Boston-area groups requested that the Education Department review the practice, saying the college’s admissions policies discriminated against Black, Hispanic and Asian applicants, in favor of less qualified white candidates with alumni and donor connections.

 

“Why are we rewarding children for privileges and advantages accrued by prior generations?” asked Ivan Espinoza-Madrigal, executive director of Lawyers for Civil Rights, which is handling the case. “Your family’s last name and the size of your bank account are not a measure of merit, and should have no bearing on the college admissions process.”

 

The complaint from liberal groups comes days after a conservative group, Students for Fair Admissions, won its Supreme Court case.

 

In a statement after the Supreme Court decision, President Biden said he would ask the department to examine “practices like legacy admissions and other systems that expand privilege instead of opportunity.”

 

A spokeswoman for Harvard, Nicole Rura, said the school would have no comment on the complaint, but reiterated a statement from last week: “As we said, in the weeks and months ahead, the university will determine how to preserve our essential values, consistent with the court’s new precedent.”

 

Colleges argue that the practice helps build community and encourages donations, which can be used for financial aid.

 

A poll released last year by the Pew Research Center found that an increasing share of the public — 75 percent — believed that legacy preferences should not be a factor in who was admitted to college.

 

And the call for eliminating legacy and donor preferences has grown recently across the political spectrum.

 

Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Democrat of New York, tweeted that if the Supreme Court “was serious about their ludicrous ‘colorblindness’ claims, they would have abolished legacy admissions, aka affirmative action for the privileged.”

 

Senator Tim Scott, Republican of South Carolina and a presidential candidate, said, “One of the things that Harvard could do to make that even better is to eliminate any legacy programs where they have preferential treatment for legacy kids.”

 

In its decision on race-conscious admissions, some Supreme Court justices criticized legacy admissions. Justice Neil M. Gorsuch, in an opinion concurring with the court’s majority, took aim at preferences for the children of donors and alumni, saying: “They are no help to applicants who cannot boast of their parents’ good fortune or trips to the alumni tent all their lives. While race-neutral on their face, too, these preferences undoubtedly benefit white and wealthy applicants the most.”

 

In her dissenting opinion, Justice Sonia Sotomayor referred to legacy admissions, arguing that continuing race-based preferences was only fair in light of the fact that most of the pieces in the admissions puzzle “disfavor underrepresented racial minorities.”

 

The complaint to the Education Department was filed by three groups — Chica Project, African Community Economic Development of New England and Greater Boston Latino Network.

Source

[Aston Martin]

As they should. Legacy admissions are what affirmative action is mischaracterized as (by people acting in bad faith).

[BlueTimberwolf]

3 hours ago, Aston Martin said:

As they should. Legacy admissions are what affirmative action is mischaracterized as (by people acting in bad faith).

The problem is most schools make their money with donations, and legacy admits donate the most.  

[Protocol]

They will never get rid of this because they want the money from donors. Rich families will stop donations if their grandkids can't get in anymore. 

 

One way to fix this would be to get rid of the insanely bloated administrations most universities have*. Less need for all their salaries = less need to cater to donors via legacy admissions. But of course the administrators don't want to fire themselves.

 

*source: used to work in communications in higher ed. Seriously it's like thousands of BS paper pushing jobs that exist solely for their own sake. The university I worked for which was Top 3 in Canada literally has positions for people whose job it is to try to market the university in other parts of Canada, despite it being widely known as a Top 3 university that gets vastly more applicants that it can accept. There was zero need to pay half a million a year in salaries and benefits to people whose jobs are totally redundant and useless. 

[ugo]

14 minutes ago, Protocol said:

They will never get rid of this because they want the money from donors. Rich families will stop donations if their grandkids can't get in anymore. 

 

One way to fix this would be to get rid of the insanely bloated administrations most universities have*. Less need for all their salaries = less need to cater to donors via legacy admissions. But of course the administrators don't want to fire themselves.

 

*source: used to work in communications in higher ed. Seriously it's like thousands of BS paper pushing jobs that exist solely for their own sake. The university I worked for which was Top 3 in Canada literally has positions for people whose job it is to try to market the university in other parts of Canada, despite it being widely known as a Top 3 university that gets vastly more applicants that it can accept. There was zero need to pay half a million a year in salaries and benefits to people whose jobs are totally redundant and useless. 

I think some of these positions are essential for international promotion. Canadian universities make a lot of money off international students since their tuition is double or more of any students.

 

 

Anyway are there that many Legacy admission even ? they are kind kind of useful they finance buildings and stuff like that.

[BlueTimberwolf]

3 hours ago, Protocol said:

They will never get rid of this because they want the money from donors. Rich families will stop donations if their grandkids can't get in anymore. 

 

One way to fix this would be to get rid of the insanely bloated administrations most universities have*. Less need for all their salaries = less need to cater to donors via legacy admissions. But of course the administrators don't want to fire themselves.

 

*source: used to work in communications in higher ed. Seriously it's like thousands of BS paper pushing jobs that exist solely for their own sake. The university I worked for which was Top 3 in Canada literally has positions for people whose job it is to try to market the university in other parts of Canada, despite it being widely known as a Top 3 university that gets vastly more applicants that it can accept. There was zero need to pay half a million a year in salaries and benefits to people whose jobs are totally redundant and useless. 

Some of it is administrative bloat. But most of it is for the multitudes of special programs, student departments, etc. that are expected of a major university in 2023.  Students expect to have "college experience", with a variety clubs and majors and will apply elsewhere if a school can't provide it.   =That takes people, and they expect to be paid well enough to pay off their student loans.  

[banterfly]

Not sure how this will fly at all.

[VOSS]

11 hours ago, ugo said:

I think some of these positions are essential for international promotion. Canadian universities make a lot of money off international students since their tuition is double or more of any students.

 

 

Anyway are there that many Legacy admission even ? they are kind kind of useful they finance buildings and stuff like that.

Harvard is like 1/3 legacy  

[poki]

Article is blocked 

 

But I saw discussions online about this. Apparently 36% of their students are white + legacy while 4% are white and not legacy. 

 

So 90% of the white people there, are likely there only because they were born rich 

 

 

[VOSS]

Quote

The U.S. Department of Education has opened an investigation into Harvard University’s use of donor and legacy admissions preferences, a month after the Supreme Court ruled the school’s use of race-conscious preferences unconstitutional.

 

The Education Department’s Office for Civil Rights confirmed on Tuesday that it launched the investigation this week in response to a separate complaint filed last month on behalf of three Massachusetts-based organizations serving communities of color. The complaint alleges that Harvard College violates Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 by giving preference to undergraduate applicants whose relatives are university alumni or donors. 

Lawyers for Civil Rights called for the university to follow the lead of other colleges that have already ended the consideration of legacy and donor preferences in their admissions decisions.

 

“Federal antidiscrimination law is clear: federally-funded institutions may not utilize unfair and unjustified preferences that harm qualified students of color,” the organization said in its statement.

 

In an emailed statement, Harvard spokesperson Nicole Rura said the university is currently reviewing its admissions policies and data to ensure its compliance with the Supreme Court’s decision, while doubling down on the university’s commitment to diversity.

 

“As this work continues, and moving forward, Harvard remains dedicated to opening doors to opportunity and to redoubling our efforts to encourage students from many different backgrounds to apply for admission,” Rura said.

WSJ