Black students at Harvard University’s freshman class dropped to 14% this fall compared to 18% in 2023|Adam Fagen|CC BY-NC-SA 2.0
The number of Black students attending first-year at Harvard University dropped to 14% this fall compared to 18% in 2023, according to data released yesterday.
The dip comes a year after the US Supreme Court ruled affirmative action programs, which enabled race-based admissions into colleges, as unconstitutional.
Similar drops in student diversity are spotted in other Ivy League schools, such as MIT, Brown University, and Amherst College.
-
Only 16% of MIT students are Black, Hispanic, Native American, or Pacific Islander, compared to 31% in the previous four years.
-
Brown’s share of Black and Hispanic students went from 15% and 14% to 9% and 10%, respectively, per the school’s newspaper.
-
Amherst has only 3% Black students compared to 11% last year.
At the same time
Some schools, like Princeton, Yale, and the University of Virginia, saw little to no change in minority enrollment from the previous years.
While the full impact of the Supreme Court’s affirmative action decision may take years to unfold, the universities are witnessing notable drops in diversity (something experts had warned about).
What is Harvard doing?
The Ivy League has increased recruitment efforts, focusing on outreach to rural communities and removing application barriers.