Featured Article: “U.S. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon Directs National Center for Education Statistics to Collect Universities’ Data on Race Discrimination in Admissions”

Since the June 2023 Supreme Court decision Students for Fair Admissions v. President and Fellows of Harvard College (SFFA), which formally declared the use of racial quotas in college admissions illegal and discriminatory under Title VI and the Fourteenth Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause, measures to ensure higher ed’s compliance with the law have been sparse. Until now.
 

Last Thursday, U.S. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon instructed the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) “to collect admissions data for institutions of higher education that will allow Americans to ensure race-based preferences are not used in university admissions processes.” This information will be made publicly available to the American people, providing previously unavailable transparency.
 

To receive federal funding through Title VI, higher education institutions already complete surveys with the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS)—overseen by the NCES—which collects data related to admissions, enrollment, and financial information. Under President Trump’s directive, Secretary McMahon’s order expands upon this existing data collection by IPEDS. Within 120 days of the Department of Education’s (ED) notice, colleges and universities will be required to make the following changes for the 2025-26 term:
 

• The ED’s data collection will be “disaggregated by race and sex relating to the applicant pool, admitted cohort, and enrolled cohort at the undergraduate level, and for specific graduate and professional programs.”
• Colleges and universities will be required to detail “quantitative measures of applicants and admitted students’ academic achievement”—i.e., standardized test scores, GPAs, first-generation-college- student status, and other applicant characteristics, for each race-and-sex pair. 
• NCES will expand the scope of the collection for enrolled cohorts to include data for each race-and-sex pair’s graduation rates, final GPAs, financial aid offered, financial aid provided, and other relevant measures. Along with instructing the NCES to determine if any additional information is needed from postsecondary institutions to ensure IPEDS fulfills the mission of providing transparency in admissions. 
• Finally, NCES is directed to develop a rigorous quality assurance process for reported data to ensure the information collected by the ED is accurate and reliable.

In releasing its memo, the ED joined the Department of Justice (DOJ) in efforts to curtail race-based programming and activities. Attorney General Pam Bondi released a memo at the end of last month reminding entities which take federal funding, and are thus subject to federal anti-discrimination laws—like colleges and universities—that proxy discrimination like geographic recruitment is illegal, among other things. Some think the DOJ targeting geographic recruitment—i.e., recruiting from a specific city, neighborhood, or high school—is unfair, especially as colleges and universities engage in their last minute recruitment efforts before the semester begins. 
 

After SFFA when race-based admissions were barred, geographic targeting/recruitment gained popularity as a way to boost low-income and historically underserved students, bolstering “racial diversity in incoming classes.” When used as a proxy for race, geographic recruitment is discriminatory. If colleges and universities are truly recruiting students via geographic recruitment without regard to race—like targeting areas where minorities and low-income students live over other areas—the data should leave them with nothing to worry about, right?
 

The National Association of Scholars has long advocated for transparency—especially in relation to admissions data and recruitment strategies. Previously, any information regarding detailed admissions data was only obtained through lawsuits or FOIAs, so it is a big step in the right direction to make this information publicly available. 
 

The ED and DOJ’s memos show that the current administration is taking Title VI and the Fourteenth Amendment's Equal Protection Clause seriously. Objective assessments of merit and achievement should be the ruling order of the day, so one can hope that the ED and DOJ’s increased oversight will ensure SFFA compliance that lasts. And that schools will not quietly continue to circumvent the law by passing over qualified students based on race.
 

Until next week.

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