With affirmative action cases heating up and President George W. Bush expressing his opposition to race-based admissions, other factors are being looked at in biased admissions policies.
Now coming under the magnifying glass are “legacies,” or students applying to a university of which their parents are alumni. Universities give preference to children of alumni for a few different reasons, mainly dealing with loyalty and funding for colleges.
“We have a very strong alumni base and a strong affection and value for families,” Notre Dame spokesman Matthew Storin said. He also stressed the loyalty expressed to alumni by giving preference to legacies.
“We are not at all defensive that we are a university that gives strong attention to children of alumni,” Storin said.
In the eyes of Storin, children of graduates are awarded a significant advantage for being born into these families.
Recent data suggests legacies have much higher acceptance rates at top universities and also make up a larger portion of the overall population of students. At Notre Dame, 57 percent of students admitted were children of alumni, with 23 percent of these students actually enrolling at the university.
Ridding admissions policies of legacy preference could result in financial implications for many universities. Alumni account for more than 28 percent of all private donations given to institutions of higher education. This percentage amounted to an approximate $6.83 billion for the 2000-01 academic year.
At the University of Wisconsin, being the child of an alumni can offer a slight advantage in the admissions process, just as race does. These are all considered “plus factors” in the admissions office; however, they are still just one of the many factors considered when deciding whether to admit a student.
“It is a very minor factor at UW,” Tom Riesen, assistant director for admissions, said.
Like Storin, Riesen expressed his belief that giving a slight advantage to children of graduates offers loyalty to families who provide support for UW.
“Other universities, like Notre Dame, value in a very high way those individuals who have attended those universities in the past,” Riesen said. “At UW, there are a significant number of individuals who come from alumni families, but their alumni status is a very minor factor for admission.”
The University of Virginia, University of Pennsylvania, Harvard and Princeton are a few of the other institutions that admitted a significant number of legacy students. Overall, 10 to 15 percent of students at many Ivy League institutions are children of graduates and are also admitted in much higher rates than other students.
The University of Pennsylvania admitted an approximate 41 percent of legacies and enrolled 14 percent of them. Ron Ozio, manager of media relations at Penn, denied comment on why children of alumni are generally given preference in the admission process.
Gary Orfield, Harvard University professor of education and social policy, believes there is a good reason for affirmative action in admissions policies regarding race and legacy admittance.
“We have all kinds of preferences, which is a perfectly healthy part of the admissions process,” Orfield said. “It is good to have affirmative action.”
However, Orfield admitted that legacy students are primarily white. So although diversity is encouraged, giving legacy students this preference makes it increasingly more difficult for a minority student to gain admittance to a university such as Harvard.
Recently, President Bush made his opposition to racial preferences clear through the two briefs filed with the Supreme Court. President Bush is offering other alternatives for increasing diversity and has given no comment on whether or not universities will be able to give racial preferences when deciding whether or not to admit a student.
“We are gravely [concerned] about this case, because of our location and Catholic heritage,” Storin said. “We have struggled with numbers of African American and Asian students in the past; however, it is premature to know what the court might decide.”
