Education Dept. begins civil rights probe of Harvard’s legacy admissions

Harvard University is facing a federal inquiry over its practice of admitting relatives of alumni to study at the world-renowned institution, known as “legacy admissions.”

The Education Department opened the investigation after three groups filed a complaint against the Ivy League school, arguing its use of legacy admissions discriminated against more qualified non-white candidates.

“The Office for Civil Rights can confirm that there is an open investigation of Harvard University under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964,” a spokesperson for the department told The Post.

“We do not comment on open investigations.”

Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 prohibits discrimination “on the ground of race, color or national origin.”

The three groups urged the Education Department to asses whether legacy admissions unfairly excluded black, Hispanic, and Asian applicants.

The complaint came on the heels of last month’s landmark Supreme Court decision that nixed the use of race-based affirmative action in admissions decisions at most institutions of higher learning. Since the ruling came down, conservatives and liberals alike have urged the end of legacy admissions, claiming scrapping the practice would produce more diverse student bodies.

As part of the inquiry, the department will assess “whether the university discriminates on the basis of race by using donor and legacy preferences in its undergraduate admissions process,” according to a letter sent to Harvard Monday.

“Harvard remains dedicated to opening doors to opportunity and to redoubling our efforts to encourage students from many different backgrounds to apply for admission,” a spokesperson for the school told The Post.

The three groups that called for an inquiry were the Chica Project, African Community Economic Development of New England and Greater Boston Latino Network. The complaint with the Education Department was filed on their behalf by Boston-based nonprofit Lawyers for Civil Rights.

The group argued that students with legacy ties are up to seven times more likely to be admitted to Harvard, can make up nearly a third of a class and that about 70% are white. For the Class of 2019, about 28% of the class had a parent or other relative who went to Harvard.

President Biden had said he would task the department with reviewing “practices like legacy admissions and other systems that expand privilege instead of opportunity” following the affirmative action decision.

Harvard has been scrambling to comply with the Supreme Court’s ruling, which does allow institutions to consider “an applicant’s discussion of how race affected his or her life, be it through discrimination, inspiration, or otherwise.”

“We are in the process of reviewing aspects of our admissions policies to assure compliance with the law and to carry forward Harvard’s longstanding commitment to welcoming students of extraordinary talent and promise who come from a wide range of backgrounds, perspectives, and life experiences,” the university spokesperson added Tuesday.

Harvard, the oldest institution of higher learning in the US, has long courted wealthy alumni and donors via its legacy process and has an endowment of more than $50 billion.

Last week, Wesleyan University in Connecticut announced that it would end its policy of giving preferential treatment in admissions to those whose families have historical ties to the school. University President Michael Roth said a student’s “legacy status” has played a negligible role in admissions, but would now be eliminated entirely.

In recent years, other schools — including Amherst College in Massachusetts, Carnegie Mellon University in Pennsylvania and Johns Hopkins University in Maryland — also have eliminated legacy admissions.

A study led by Harvard and Brown researchers, published Monday, found that wealthy students were twice as likely to be admitted to elite schools compared to their lower- or middle-income counterparts who have similar standardized test scores.

The study looked at family income and admissions data at all eight Ivy League schools (Brown, Columbia, Cornell, Dartmouth, Harvard, Penn, Princeton, and Yale) as well as Stanford, MIT, Duke and the University of Chicago. It found that legacy admissions policies were a contributing factor to the advantage high-income students have at these schools. Athletic recruitment and extracurricular credentials, which are stronger when students attend affluent private high schools, were the other two factors.

With Post wires