WashU’s Class of 2028 is the first class since 1961 to have gone through the admissions process without Affirmative Action policies. With the start of the semester, the data is out on how the Supreme Court’s abolishment of Affirmative Action has impacted the racial makeup of WashU’s newest class. Most notably, enrollment by students of color decreased by six percentage points. 

Although, the amount of students who are low- to moderate-income or Pell Grant-eligible went up, and the percentage of students receiving financial aid increased from 42% to 48%. The number of first-generation students went up from 16% to 17%.   

Leany Pino-Sanchez is a student in the Class of 2028 from Puerto Rico. She said she thinks the affirmative-action ban “is going to cause less diversity at prominent schools, and is going to further the gap between social classes.”

Affirmative action is the practice of considering an applicant’s race or ethnicity as a factor in admissions, and was first implemented to increase racial and ethnic diversity at higher-education institutions. 

The overall enrollment of students of color went down by six percentage points this year compared to last year — from 53% in the Class of 2027 to 47% in the Class of 2028. Further, Black and African-American student enrollment was four percentage points lower, down from 11.9% for the Class of 2027 to 8% in the Class of 2028. The number of white students increased by one percentage point, while the number of Asian and Hispanic students decreased by roughly one percentage point each.

The percentage of students who chose not to disclose their race increased by four percentage points. 

“Since in Puerto Rico we have a different zip code, [admissions officers] knew that I wasn’t from the United States,” Pino-Sanchez said. “But I have friends in the States that, since they couldn’t put their ethnicity in [their application], there was no way to differentiate unless it was in the essay.”

Affirmative action was commonplace in admissions offices, especially at selective universities like WashU, until it was banned in June of 2023. In response to the ban, the WashU admissions office added an optional short-answer question to the application about applicants’ experiences in their community, according to Assistant Vice Provost and Director of Admissions, Grace Chapin James.

“I think that [question] was a welcoming space for a lot of students who felt like they wanted to talk a little bit more about [their] race or identity in other ways in their application that might not have otherwise been present,” James said. “So they certainly took advantage of that.”

James said that this question was not just for applicants to showcase identifiers that would have been considered through former Affirmative Action practices, but also to talk about other aspects of their lives that they were unable to share with the admissions committee before.

According to a press release from The Source, the admissions office is permitted to collect these answers, as they provide contextual information about the student — in accordance with the Supreme Court ruling.

“[N]ot that they identify as Latinx, for instance, but how their identity shaped their experiences, character, aspirations or opportunities,” Ronné Turner, Vice Provost for Admissions & Financial Aid, told the Source. “And a good percentage of students did choose to give us some additional information about who they are and what motivates them.”

“​​I think [WashU] had good essay questions. Others were too general, and I didn’t get to speak much about myself,” Pino-Sanchez said.

In response to the end of affirmative action, Chancellor Andrew Martin pledged to provide the admissions office with additional funding to implement new programs in support of historically underrepresented communities at private institutions. 

In addition to hiring additional admissions officers to do outreach and recruitment at underserved high schools, including in places like Georgia and Texas, they also created a new position for a dual admissions officer/financial aid staff member for the St. Louis region. 

“A lot of students in our area don't necessarily feel like they have opportunities at WashU, and [they] also often lack support or resources to understand how to apply for financial assistance at colleges. So [they often] rule out schools like WashU, thinking [those schools] are going to be too expensive,” James said. 

The new dual role will support local high-schoolers in understanding how the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) and College Scholarship Service (CSS) programs work — not just for WashU, but for all schools they may be applying to. 

According to James, students who would qualify for financial aid are often dissuaded from applying to expensive private schools like WashU, when in reality their reduced tuition can often amount to less than what they would be asked to pay at a state school.

“[The goal is] just talking and sort of demystifying the process of financial aid in local high schools and in the St. Louis community to make sure folks feel empowered,” James said.