Liam Knox at Inside Higher Ed:
A lawsuit against Yale University over its affirmative action policies was dropped on Thursday after the university agreed to make significant changes to its admissions policies.
The lawsuit was filed in 2021 by Students for Fair Admissions, the group that brought the affirmative action cases against Harvard and the University of North Carolina that resulted in the Supreme Court decision in June striking down race-conscious admissions. The Yale case was stayed pending the outcome of the Harvard and UNC cases but reopened in July.
The agreement stipulates that Yale make some of the most significant and wide-reaching admissions policy changes to be spurred by the Supreme Court’s ruling so far, encompassing not only race-conscious admissions but financial aid and data transparency as well.
They include:
- Updating the university’s training materials to make the ban on considering race explicit to application readers and admissions counselors.
- Taking “technological steps” to ensure that nobody involved in admissions decisions has access to data on the racial identity of individual applicants during the review process.
- Refraining from producing reports on the aggregate racial or ethnic makeup of applicants or admitted students during the review process.
- Ensuring that race is not a factor in any financial aid calculations or rewards
