MIT Sees Drop Off In Black, Latino Enrollment After Affirmative Action Ban

Massachusetts Institute of Technology has reported a major drop in Black and Latino student enrollment in the wake of the Surpreme Court's decision to ban affirmative action .

On Wednesday (August 21), MIT announced that only 16 percent of the students in the university's incoming class of 2028 identify as Black, Hispanic, Native American, or Pacific Islander, per the New York Times . That number is down from the university's baseline of about 25 percent.

This is the university's first undergraduate class to be admitted since the Supreme Court moved to ban affirmative action.

When comparing the incoming class to the class of 2027, the percentage of Black students dropped to 5 percent from 15 percent. Hispanic and Latino students made up 16 percent of the class of 2027 compared to 2028's 11 percent.

The percentage of Asian Americans rose from 40 percent to 47 percent.

The announcement of MIT's statistics comes after a lawsuit against Harvard that alleged the university discriminated against Asian American applicants made it to the nation's highest court and resulted in the affirmative action ban.

“The class is, as always, outstanding across multiple dimensions,” Sally Kornbluth , president of M.I.T., said a statement, adding, “What it does not bring, as a consequence of last year’s Supreme Court decision, is the same degree of broad racial and ethnic diversity that the M.I.T. community has worked together to achieve over the past several decades.”

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