Legacy admission is continuing to face scrutiny. Last month, the advocacy group Education Reform Now (ERN) published the fifth installment of its series “The Future of Fair Admissions,” focused on the evolving landscape of legacy admissions in higher education. The new brief promises to revive long-standing critiques of the practice, which faced mounting criticisms in the wake of the 2023 Supreme Court decision ending affirmative action.
ERN’s latest publication follows the Department of Education’s 2023 investigation into Harvard’s use of legacy and donor preferences. Congress proposed a bipartisan bill calling for the end of the practice that same year. These moves reflect a popular sentiment opposing the use of legacy admissions. According to a 2022 Pew Research Center survey, 75% of Americans believe that legacy status should not be considered in the admissions process. This public disapproval has steadily come to the fore in recent years. Likewise, seven out of eight admissions office directors believe legacy status should not come to bear on admissions decisions. This disapproval is echoed on Ivy League campuses as well—last year, The Brown Daily Herald found that 58.4% of students oppose the practice. The university is in the process of reconsidering its use of legacy status in admissions.
Despite widespread pushback, Ivy League universities continue to insist on the importance of legacy in the admissions process. The Supreme Court’s move to end affirmative action in 2023 put legacy admissions under more intense scrutiny. Universities have grappled with ways to build diverse classes without race-conscious policies, demonstrating a commitment to creating inclusive communities through meritocracy. This commitment is often regarded as incompatible with the priority given to socioeconomically advantaged children of alums through legacy admissions.
The ERN report indicates that this mounting criticism may be resulting in policy changes—both in admissions offices and in state legislatures—across the U.S.. Here are three key takeaways from the brief:
1. Legacy admissions are on the decline
As of 2025, only 24% of four-year colleges consider legacy status in admissions, a sharp decrease from 49% in 2015. Following the 2023 Supreme Court decision banning race-conscious admissions, 92 colleges ceased considering legacy status, marking an 18% decrease from 2022. Currently, only 11% of public colleges (62 institutions) consider legacy status, whereas 30% of private colleges (358 institutions) maintain the practice. Notably, in 24 states, no public institutions of higher education offer legacy preference.
These dramatic changes place even more of a spotlight on Ivy League institutions, which have some of the highest legacy admissions rates, as well as the most insistent defenses of the process. While schools such as Brown are reconsidering the use of legacy considerations, there is little indication that Ivy League schools will end the practice voluntarily, which could result in even more public criticism of the Ivy League following years of bad publicity.
2. Legacy admissions does not correspond to increased donations
Overwhelmingly, legacy preferences persist predominantly at the wealthiest and most selective institutions, with over half still granting advantages to alumni relatives. Many of these schools—and defenders of legacy considerations—argue that the practice is necessary for bringing in financial support to the university. However, the brief contests this claim. ERN cited two studies that refuted the correlation between giving and legacy admissions. One found “no statistically significant evidence that legacy preferences impact total alumni giving”; the other found that giving increased as children approached college application age, stalled after admissions decisions were released, and decreased further if the child was rejected. These findings present challenges to institutional arguments for the benefits and even necessity of legacy considerations.
3. State legislatures are taking action against the practice
In 2024, four states joined Colorado in banning legacy admissions in some capacity, bringing the total to five states prohibiting the practice—Maryland, California, Virginia (prohibited in public schools), Colorado (prohibited in public schools), and Illinois (prohibited in public schools). The California ban on legacy admissions will go into effect in the fall of 2025. These legislative actions aim to promote equity and dismantle systemic advantages in college admissions. Meanwhile, this year, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New York are re-introducing bills to eliminate legacy admissions. New Jersey introduced a bill that is currently being debated. Illinois has banned legacy admissions in public institutions; its current bill would eliminate the practice in private institutions as well.
As the brief notes, as greater legislative action is taken against legacy admissions, even institutions that have sidestepped statewide bans (such as the Ivy League schools) could still face governmental repercussions: “It is possible that as Congress explores an expanded endowment tax on the nation’s wealthiest universities, it could impose an additional penalty on institutions that continue to provide a legacy preference and reduce the penalty at institutions that increase the enrollment percentage of Pell-eligible students, community college students, and veterans.”
What This Means for Applicants
While these changes may seem like an innocuous shift, they could have significant reverberations in the admissions processes at top schools.
At institutions that consider legacy in the admissions process, the boost from legacy status can be dramatic. A 2023 civil rights complaint against Harvard reported that between 2014 and 2019, donor-related applicants were a whopping seven times more likely to be admitted to Harvard than other applicants, while legacy applicants were almost six times more likely to be admitted. Though “recruited athletes, legacies, relatives of donors and children of faculty and staff” make up less than 5% of the applicant pool, they constitute approximately 30% of those accepted each year. At Princeton, legacy applicants are four times more likely to earn admission. In a 2022 interview, Notre Dame’s former head of enrollment Don Bishop estimated that 19–25% of the school’s incoming class is made up of legacy students each year. The school has one of the highest rates of legacy admission nationally.
This means that eliminating the practice could have a dramatic impact on the admissions process at these prestigious institutions. Students with legacy status should in no way rely on their connections as an indication of their odds of admission. Younger students who hold legacy status should anticipate that schools will repeal these considerations—whether voluntarily or legislatively—and focus on building a dynamic profile outside of their connections to the university.
As more states and policymakers push for change, and as public opposition continues to grow, legacy admissions may not survive much longer. The coming admissions cycles will determine whether colleges choose to phase out the practice on their own—or whether government intervention will force their hand. Regardless of the outcome, students should focus on crafting a compelling admissions profile that will stand out to admissions officers on its own merit. In the rapidly evolving admissions landscape, students should not expect that any single aspect of their application will guarantee admission. Instead, they should focus on starting early, developing a clear and focused strategy, and demonstrating that their authentic profile renders them a strong fit for their target institution.