This time of year can be pretty boring for college admission news. While admission offices work through their piles of applications, there’s usually not much to report until they start sending decisions and stats. But this month has brought three major pieces of news. Below is a quick summary of each, with links to learn more, and my ideas about how likely the news is to affect you, a current high school student.
16 colleges are being sued over their financial aid practices.
What’s the story? Colleges aren’t supposed share notes with each other on their financial aid decisions. Each school has to come up with their own offers—and their own way of deciding how much to offer—so that students can compare offers and go to the school with the most financial aid if they choose. There has to be competition, and that’s the law. However, there’s a group with an exemption to the law. They get together and come up with a single shared “methodology” for determining financial aid awards. They’re able to do this because they don’t discuss who gets accepted, and because they’re all need blind, meaning your ability to pay isn’t part of their decision to accept you. That, says the law, is competitive enough. But the lawsuit, brought by five people, says that nine of the colleges aren’t exactly need blind. Because the admission offices may track which applicants are from families that are big donors—or have the potential to be big donors—then the ability to pay is in fact a consideration…and one that only works in the favor of wealthy applicants. They’re essentially competing for rich students and then conspiring with each other about how much to offer the not-rich students. So, say the people suing the schools, they’re not actually need blind and therefore shouldn’t be allowed to share information. What about the other seven schools? The lawsuit claims that since most of the schools in the group are tainted by the double-standard, the whole group is, because they all share their data to come up with a shared “methodology.”
Will this affect you? Probably not. Lawsuits like this take a long time to work their way through the courts. It’s likely that you will be through college, or at least already in college, before this litigation has any impact. But technically, if the group decides to disband soon, and if you apply to any of the 16 colleges and are accepted, then it could affect your financial aid offer. Technically. But nobody knows what that effect might be.
Want to read more?
Lawsuit says 16 elite colleges are part of price-fixing cartel. (New York Times)
Class action suit filed against to private colleges. (Inside Higher Ed)
Affirmative Action case is going to the Supreme Court.
What’s the story? Colleges and universities are legally allowed to consider race as a factor for admission. There are some guidelines, though: race can be used in order to increase the educational goal of diversity; it can’t be used to make schools intentionally less diverse. There can’t be quotas; a school can’t decide beforehand that, for example, 25% of their students will be Black. Race can only be used as part of a holistic approach; it can't be the only, or first, criteria. Affirmative Action has been upheld by the Supreme Court—including those guideline—as recently as 2016. But now the Supreme Court will hear two previously separate cases combined into a single one. Both Harvard and UNC won their initial Affirmative Action cases when they were sued by an anti-affirmative-action group. Harvard also won their case in the next level of appeal. But the Supreme Court is willing to hear both the cases, and the basic assumption is that they wouldn’t want to take the cases unless they were willing to change something about the laws.
Will this affect you? Possibly. The case won’t be heard until this October at the earliest, and nobody’s expecting a ruling until summer of 2023. But if there’s a major change to what’s considered legal, then universities may make some fairly large changes pretty quickly after that. But what kinds of changes those may be depends on the outcome of the case, which won’t happen for a while. So it’s possible there will be some major new rules around race and admission by the time younger high school students apply to college, but it’s far from guaranteed.
Want to read more?
Supreme Court will hear challenge to Affirmative Action at Harvard and U.N.C. (New York Times)
Supreme Court takes affirmative action case. (Inside Higher Ed)
The SAT is making some major changes.
What’s the story? Beginning in 2023 outside the US and 2024 in the US, the SAT will only be given online. It will be administered in test centers; students will not be taking it at home. Not only is the test going digital, but the format will change. There will be shorter reading passages with fewer questions. Calculators will be allowed for all math portions. Instead of every student answering all of the same questions, the computer program will use different questions to “figure out” what level you’re at in less time with fewer questions. The new test will take around two hours instead of three, and 80% of the students who took the pilot test said it was less stressful than the old pencil-and-paper test.
Will this affect you? If you’re in the 9th grade now, then absolutely it will. You may end up taking the new SAT, you make take the ACT, you may take both, you may take neither. But if you already hear strategizing and scheming at your school around standardized tests (Should I take the test? Which one? How many times? What do my scores mean? Should I report them to test-optional schools?), then those conversations are going to be amplified in the coming years as people try to figure out what to make of the new SAT. I hope you won’t get stressed about the SAT. But if you were already inclined to get stressed about the SAT, this is going to make it worse. At least until you take the test, which they say will be be less stressful. Maybe. Be prepared.
Want to read more?
Put down your No. 2 pencils. Forever. (New York Times)
The new SAT. (Inside Higher Ed)
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