Life After Affirmative Action At MIT

We now know what the end of affirmative action looks like at a major, highly selective national university. 

Mostly, black and Latino enrollments are down, while Asian American enrollments are up. The magnitude of the shift will probably be smaller at less selective colleges and universities.

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s incoming class of 2028 saw a precipitous drop off in the percentage of Black, Hispanic, Native American and Pacific Islander students, the university announced on Wednesday. It is the university’s first undergraduate class to be admitted since the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision last year banning affirmative action.

For the incoming class of 2028, about 16 percent of students are Black, Hispanic, Native American and Pacific Islander, compared to a baseline of about 25 percent of undergraduate students in recent years, the announcement said.

The comparison to the class of 2027 was even more dramatic. The percentage of Black students enrolled dropped to 5 percent from 15 percent, and the percentage of Hispanic and Latino students dropped to 11 percent from 16 percent. White students made up 37 percent of the new class, compared to 38 percent last year.

The percentage of Asian American students in the class rose to 47 percent from 40 percent.

From the New York Times.