The California State Legislature has passed a ban against legacy and donor preferences in college … [+]
The California State Legislature passed a bill last week that would ban the state’s private colleges from giving admission preferences to applicants who are related to alumni or who have ties with donors to the institutions.
The ban, contained in Assembly Bill 1780, would take effect on September 1, 2025, if California Governor Gavin Newsom signs it into law.
If AB 1780 were to become law, California would become the fifth state to enact some type of ban against colleges giving an advantage to the relatives of alumni or institutional donors. In August, Illinois became the fourth state to pass a legacy admission prohibition, following Maryland, which enacted a legacy admission ban in April that applies to both public and private colleges. Colorado passed its ban in 2021, and Virginia did so earlier this year.
Introduced by California Assemblymember Phil Ting, the bill has undergone significant revisions from earlier versions. In its original form, it would have prohibited the state’s private universities from receiving funding through the Cal Grant student financial aid program if they gave preferential admissions treatment to applicants who had donor or alumni connections. That provision was later amended so that a school that extended a legacy or donor preference would have faced a civil fine equal to the amount of CalGrants it received in the prior year.
But that penalty was removed from the bill as well before its final passage. Now an institution that violates the ban will be required to report to the Legislature and the California Department of Justice whether it is in compliance or violation of the bill’s provisions, and if in violation, to also report, for that academic year, the admission rates of students receiving a legacy or donor “bump” compared to the remainder of the student body. They would also be required to report on the racial, geographic and financial diversity of admitted students, in addition to their athletic status.
The bill further requires that the names of any colleges that violate the bill be posted on the department’s website by the next fiscal year.
“Equal opportunity is the name of the game here. Everyone should be considered fairly. Hard work, good grades and a well-rounded background should earn you a spot in the incoming class – not the size of the check your family can write or who you’re related to,” said Ting in a statement. “If we value diversity in higher education, we must level the playing field. That means making the college application process more fair and equitable.”
California’s public colleges and universities currently do not consider family or door connections in their admission processes. However, according to a press release from Ting’s office, the latest reports submitted to the state legislature show that for the Fall of 2023, six California colleges and universities continue to give preferential treatment to candidates related to graduates and donors. The University of Southern California had the most, admitting 1,791 students in that category, while Stanford had 295. Santa Clara University had 38. Claremont McKenna and Harvey Mudd each had 15 students. Northeastern had less than ten.
The fairness of legacy preferences has been challenged for years, resulting in several prominent colleges electing to discontinue them. However, pressure against the practice has been ratcheted up ever since the Supreme Court decision in Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard University and Students for Fair Admissions v. University of North Carolina finding race-conscious admissions to be unconstitutional.
That ruling brought intensified scrutiny to the racial implications of legacy advantages extended to applicants by highly selective institutions. For example, the percentage of the freshmen class admitted at several selective colleges via the legacy route exceeds the percentage of entering freshmen who are Black, according to a report prepared by Education Reform Now. At many of these colleges, three-quarters or more of the legacy applicants receiving acceptances are white.
Those kinds of results prompt the obvious question: If colleges are required to practice race-neutral admissions policies, why should they be able to continue admission practices – involving legacy or donor preferences – that appear to discriminate against nonwhite students? California is poised to become the fifth state to say they shouldn’t.