Wesleyan Waves Goodbye to Legacy Admissions
The pressure is on to eliminate Legacy Admissions at selective colleges, the colleges are feeling it. Recently, Johns Hopkins, Amherst, and Carnegie Mellon all announced that they would no longer factor legacy into their admissions decisions.
Now, Wesleyan has announced that they will no longer be factoring Legacy into their admissions process. The college’s president, Michael S. Roth stated that, historically, Legacy played a “negligible role” in the admissions process used only in cases to break ties or to pare down the admissions pool. However, he noted that the practice has become a distraction that gives an unfair advantage to certain potential students.
In a recent interview with Newsweek, Ivy Link founder, Adam Nguyen, noted Wesleyan already had low legacy admission numbers compared to the Ivy League. In other words, this move is mostly symbolic.
"I've attended a lot of alumni events where these things were discussed," said Nguyen, who attended Columbia University and Harvard Law School. "This has been in the works for a long time, and the writing has been on the wall. By that, I mean colleges recognize that it is not a good appearance in a democratic society."
Many top colleges argue that Legacy Admissions are valuable in that they give families an intergenerational attachment to a specific college and thereby keep donations high. In turn, these donations can be contributed to financial aid packages for first-generation students and other students in need of financial assistance.
Speaking of donations, Adam went on to tell Newsweek that he predicts donor status will come to have even more clout than before, depending on the college.
In the days since Affirmative Action was overturned, three Civil Rights organizations jointly filed a complaint with the Department of Education asking them to investigate the practice of Legacy Admissions at Harvard. President Biden has promised that the department will look into these claims.
We expect more colleges will slowly begin to follow this trend. We will continue to update as more information becomes available.
If your student is interested in applying to a top university and needs some help along the way, reach out to Ivy Link below. Our advisors will work one-on-one with your student to create a compelling profile through strategic extra-curricular and academic development in grades 9 through 11 and to complete the application and essays starting the summer before grade 12.
