Ex-Georgetown Admissions Officer Says Colleges Use Keywords to Find Black Students After Affirmative Action Ban

An NPR interview suggested that college admissions officers search for keywords to identify Black students.

The April 25 episode of NPR's "Code Switch," titled "In college admission, trauma is shorthand for Blackness," featured host Gene Demby speaking with Aya Waller-Bey, a former Georgetown University admissions officer. The show focuses on racial identity issues. Demby said the discussion covered how admissions essays help colleges recruit desired students, how race still plays a role after the Supreme Court struck down affirmative action, and what that reveals about valued diversity in elite institutions.

In the 2023 Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard case, the Supreme Court ruled that race cannot factor into college admissions under the 14th Amendment's Equal Protection Clause. Waller-Bey said colleges now look for other words to spot Black students.

Demby asked how they know students are being evaluated that way. "Yeah, that's an interesting question," Waller-Bey replied. "I mean, I think, increasingly so universities have to really be mindful of their institutional priorities right now because of the constraints placed on by the federal administration."

"So I think identities such as first-gen and low-income are actually becoming incredibly important," she added. "I think admissions officers and universities are trying to figure out how to mark students in the process. How can we identify students? How could we categorize them in ways that are, like, compliant and, like, constitutional?"

Demby interjected, "Right, they won't get you, like…" Waller-Bey finished, "Sued."

Waller-Bey said admissions staff seek other ways to find Black students. "So I do think there is a desire to identify students," she said. "And this is why the disclosures become incredibly tricky — right? Because the disclosures, to a certain extent — and this is what came up in my interviews with my admissions officers — disclosures give really important context for admissions officers, so they can advocate or create a rationale about why Aya might deserve to get accepted into this, you know, program, right?"

She continued, "But the consequence is students are now saying, 'OK, they need me to disclose so they can see me in this process. They need to know my background, my identity. They need to know I'm first-gen. They need to know I'm low-income. They need to know I'm Black. They need to know all these things so they can see me qualitatively now' — right — because of the limitations post the 2023 race — decision on race-conscious admissions."