A rising enrollment focus for some of the nation's most esteemed universities involves admitting a greater quantity of students from less affluent backgrounds, particularly with the current lack of affirmative action.
TL;DR
- Esteemed universities are increasing enrollment of students from less affluent backgrounds, offering no-cost tuition for lower-income families.
- Princeton University saw a record number of low-income students, with a quarter qualifying for Pell grants this year.
- Many selective colleges, including MIT and Amherst, are setting new benchmarks for low-income student enrollment through targeted initiatives.
- Focusing on economic diversity may not guarantee racial diversity, with some institutions observing a decline in minority enrollment.
Leading American universities continue to attract affluent students, yet a number of institutions are intensifying their initiatives to engage a broader demographic. This includes increasing recruitment in both city and country settings, alongside providing no-cost tuition for students from families that don't fall into the highest income brackets.
This approach might cause conflict with the national administration. The Trump administration, which has pulled funding from prestigious universities concerning various complaints, has indicated that singling out less affluent students is against the law. University officials are confident in their legal standing.
This year's incoming students at Princeton University include a record number of individuals from low-income backgrounds. A quarter of them qualify for federal Pell grants, which are grants designated for those with the greatest financial requirements. This represents a substantial increase from twenty years prior, when less than ten percent met the eligibility criteria.
“The only way to increase socioeconomic diversity is to be intentional about it,” Princeton President Christopher Eisgruber said in a statement. “Socioeconomic diversity will increase if and only if college presidents make it a priority.”
Last year, Princeton established ambitious targets to enroll a greater number of students from disadvantaged financial backgrounds, following the Supreme Court’s ban on affirmative action that impacted higher education. In the absence of race as a factor, administrators stated in a campus document, concentrating on socioeconomic diversity presents “the university’s greatest opportunity to attract diverse talent.”
The country’s most selective colleges still enroll large proportions of students from the wealthiest 1% of American families. Many of those campuses have tried for years to shed reputations of elitism, with only gradual changes in enrollment.
Colleges set records for enrollment of low-income students
This year, only a minor portion of the country's educational institutions have openly shared their figures for students from less affluent backgrounds, with comprehensive national statistics from the federal administration expected in the subsequent year. Nevertheless, preliminary figures indicate a developing pattern.
Across 17 highly selective educational institutions that have published updated figures, nearly all experienced a rise in students qualifying for Pell Grants from 2023 to the current year, as revealed by An Associated Press examination. The majority observed growth in successive years, and no institution reported a substantial decline overall during the two-year period.
Over the last two years, Yale, Duke, Johns Hopkins, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology have each established new benchmarks for the number of students receiving Pell Grants who have enrolled.
A portion of the rise can be attributed to a federal program enhancement that broadened eligibility for Pell grants during the preceding year. Nevertheless, university administrators also feel these gains mirror their own initiatives.
MIT's incoming freshman cohort has seen a 43% increase in size during the last two years, with individuals from low-income backgrounds comprising over a quarter of the current student body. Representatives from MIT pointed to their initiative offering tuition-free education for households with annual earnings below $200,000.
“MIT has always been an engine of opportunity for low-income students, and we are dedicated to ensuring we can make an MIT education accessible for students from every walk of life,” Stu Schmill, MIT’s dean of admissions, said in a statement.
Nationwide, roughly a third of undergraduate students have received Pell grants in recent years.
Two years prior, Amherst College, located in Massachusetts, eliminated tuition fees for students whose families fall within the lowest 80% of U.S. Income brackets. Additionally, the institution began covering expenses for food and accommodation for individuals earning below the median income, and it ceased giving preference to children of alumni and benefactors during the admissions process. Consequently, the proportion of low-income students admitted has seen a consistent increase, accounting for one-quarter of the incoming class this year.
Concurrently, the admissions department has intensified its outreach efforts in underserved regions across the nation, encompassing both major urban centers and smaller communities.
“When we go out and talk to students, it’s not in the fanciest ZIP codes,” said Matthew McGann, dean of admissions. “It’s in places where we know there’s a lot of talent but not a lot of opportunity.”
Racial diversity does not necessarily follow economic diversity
Many university administrators believed that emphasizing economic diversity would help maintain racial diversity, given that Black, Hispanic, and Indigenous Americans experience the nation's highest poverty levels. However, despite an increase in low-income student figures, a decline in racial diversity has been observed at numerous prestigious institutions.
Were it not for the focus on earnings, those reductions could have been more pronounced, according to Richard Kahlenberg, a fellow at the Progressive Policy Institute who supports affirmative action policies based on socioeconomic status. He characterized the most recent Pell data as “a significant step in the right direction.”
“Economic diversity is important in its own right,” he said. “It’s important that America’s leadership class — which disproportionately derives from selective colleges — include people who’ve faced economic hardships in life.”
Swarthmore College experienced the most significant surge in Pell Grant recipients, increasing from 17% to 30% over the past year.
Many universities postponed scholarship announcements pending the government's resolution of problems with a new financial aid form, but Swarthmore utilized alternative information to assess applicants' financial requirements. This enabled Swarthmore to extend scholarship offers to students even as they awaited outcomes from other institutions.
Swarthmore saw a greater number of students from lower-income backgrounds enroll than administrators had anticipated. University officials also attribute their success to efforts aimed at lowering expenses on campus, such as providing complimentary laundry services and annual stipends for students to purchase course materials.
Swarthmore's freshman class this year experienced a decline in Black enrollment, dropping to 5% from the previous year's 8%.
“In a race neutral environment, those numbers are likely to drop,” Jim Bock, the admissions dean, said in a statement. “Not all minority students are low-income, and not all majority students have significant financial means.”
The approach risks federal scrutiny
The White House has contended in legal documents that ranking students by income or location constitutes a “racial proxy”, contravening the Supreme Court's 2023 ruling that prohibited affirmative action.
In a June letter, Trump officials accused the University of California-Los Angeles of “race-based admissions in all but name.” It criticized UCLA for considering factors like applicants’ family income, ZIP code and high school profile.
Educational institutions frequently consider such details when making admissions choices. Nevertheless, the Trump administration has asserted that the Supreme Court's ruling prohibits numerous established educational methods, such as financial aid programs aimed at students from disadvantaged regions.
Already, there are signs of an impact.
At the beginning of this year, the College Board, the organization responsible for the SAT, abruptly halted a service that supplied admissions departments with extensive applicant details, such as financial information from their residential areas.
Kahlenberg and other observers interpret this as a concession due to governmental pressure. The College Board provided minimal justification, referencing alterations in federal and state regulations concerning the application of demographic data in admissions processes.
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