In June 2023, the Supreme Court ruled in Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard / UNC that race-conscious admissions — using race as a checkbox factor in admissions decisions — was unconstitutional. The decision changed how schools can use the demographic information they receive, but it did not change what applicants can write about. We are now three application cycles into the new regime, and the data is starting to clarify what actually works.
What the Court actually said
Chief Justice Roberts' majority opinion banned the use of race as a category in admissions decisions. But it explicitly preserved one carve-out, in his own words: "nothing in this opinion should be construed as prohibiting universities from considering an applicant's discussion of how race affected his or her life, be it through discrimination, inspiration, or otherwise."
In other words: schools cannot use race as a factor on its own. But they can read about how your particular life has been shaped by race, identity, or background, and they can let that affect their evaluation of you as a person.
How schools have responded
- Most selective schools added or expanded a supplemental essay prompt asking about identity, community, or background — Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Stanford, and most Ivies all have versions.
- Schools removed the demographic question from the application file shown to readers (Common App still collects it for federal reporting, but most schools' admissions readers no longer see it).
- First-gen status, which the Court did not restrict, is now the cleanest demographic signal schools can use — and several schools have publicly emphasized first-gen recruitment.
What admissions officers can still do
They can read your essay. They can read about specific experiences, communities, languages spoken at home, neighborhoods you grew up in. They can read about discrimination you have faced or perspectives you bring. They cannot tally your race box and adjust accordingly.
What this means in practice: the essays do more work now. A vague, generic essay leaves the admissions reader with nothing to work with — they cannot infer race or background from data alone. A specific, well-written essay about your particular experience gives them everything they need.
How to write about race or background well
- Be specific. Not "as a Latino student, I learned the importance of family." Instead: "My grandmother, who left Veracruz at 19 with a high-school degree she earned by correspondence, runs the household where I grew up." One specific person, one specific moment, one specific detail.
- Show how it shaped you, not what category you belong to. The essay's job is to reveal a particular person, not to inventory their identity.
- Don't lead with the demographic noun. "As a [identity], I..." is the weakest possible opening. Most readers have read 50 essays that start that way this week.
- Don't write the trauma essay if it isn't your real story. Admissions readers are excellent at distinguishing earned reflection from constructed narrative.
- If your race or background hasn't meaningfully shaped you in ways relevant to your application, write about something else. There is no obligation to write about identity.
What is unchanged
Recruited athletes, faculty children, and applicants with substantial donor connections remain in their own preference category — these were not affected by the ruling. Legacy preferences remain legal but several schools (including MIT, Caltech, Johns Hopkins, Wesleyan, and Amherst, all pre-existing) do not use them. Geographic, socioeconomic, and first-generation factors remain available to schools.
What the data shows so far
After the first post-ruling cycle (Class of 2028), most Ivies reported small to moderate decreases in Black and Latino enrollment and increases in Asian American enrollment, with significant variation by school. Schools that had emphasized identity essays in their supplements showed less change than schools that did not. The biggest predictor of demographic change at any individual school appears to be how its supplemental essays were structured.
The single most consistent pattern: students who wrote substantively about how their background shaped their thinking, in specific and concrete terms, were admitted at rates similar to pre-ruling levels. Students who wrote generically were not.