Now that the dust has finally settled, it’s time we evaluate how the SCOTUS ruling outlawing the use of race-based Affirmative Action has impacted first-generation college student enrollment at elite universities across the nation. While this ruling did not specifically change the law regarding admissions officers who consider first-generation status as part of the admissions process (this is still very much a factor!), it did curtail the enrollment of underrepresented minority students. Just how interrelated are these two numbers, and what does first-generation representation look like for the Class of 2029?

Unfortunately, first-generation status is not tracked by The Common Data Set, which is normally where we would turn to conduct a comparative analysis of the composition of first-year admits across admissions cycles. However, most colleges publish this statistic online, so there is still plenty of data to unpack. Let’s take a look:

The Colleges With the Most and Least First-Generation Students

College / University	2026 US News Rank (“Best National Universities”)	Percentage of First-Gen Students in the Class of 2029
California Institute of Technology	#11	10%
Rice University	#17	11%
Georgia Institute of Technology	#32	12%
Tufts University	#36	12%
Boston College	#36	12.42%
University of Florida	#30	~13.77%
Duke University	#7	14%
Brown University	#13	14%
Emory University	#24	14%
Dartmouth College	#13	15%
Vanderbilt University	#17	~15.5%
Washington University in St. Louis	#20	16%
Princeton University	#1	16.70%
Carnegie Mellon University	#20	17%
Yale University	#4	18%
Cornell University	#12	18%
University of North Carolina — Chapel Hill	#26	18.30%
University of Wisconsin–Madison	#36	18.76%
Columbia University	#15	19%
University of Virginia	#26	19.60%
University of Notre Dame	#20	20% (Including Pell Recipients)
Massachusetts Institute of Technology	#2	20%
Harvard University	#3	20%
Stanford University	#4	20%
New York University	#32	20%
Boston University	#42	20%
Johns Hopkins University	#7	21%
University of Pennsylvania	#7	21%
University of Southern California	#28	21%
University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign	#36	22%
The University of Texas at Austin	#30	22.60%
University of California, Berkeley	#15	26%
University of Washington	#42	27%
University of California, Los Angeles	#17	~29%
Rutgers University–New Brunswick	#42	29%
University of California, Santa Barbara	#40	~31%
University of Chicago	#6	Not Yet Available
Northwestern University	#7	Not Yet Available
University of Michigan – Ann Arbor	#20	Not Yet Available
Georgetown University	#24	Not Yet Available
University of California, San Diego	#29	Not Yet Available
University of California, Davis	#32	Not Yet Available
University of California, Irvine	#32	Not Yet Available
The Ohio State University	#41	Not Yet Available
University of Maryland, College Park	#42	Not Yet Available
Lehigh University	#46	Not Yet Available
Northeastern University	#46	Not Yet Available
Purdue University–Main Campus	#46	Not Yet Available
University of Georgia	#46	Not Yet Available
University of Rochester	#46	Not Yet Available

Which schools have the highest and lowest representation of first-generation college students? On the high end are the UC schools and other major public research universities, with UC Santa Barbara (~31%), Rutgers University–New Brunswick (29%), UC Los Angeles (~29%), and the University of Washington, Seattle (27%) taking the cake for the highest number of students who are the first in their families to attend a four-year institution.

On the low end of the spectrum are smaller, specialized universities and private colleges, with Caltech (10%), Rice University (11%), Georgia Tech (12%), and Tufts University (12%) having the lowest first-generation numbers on this list.

Among Ivy League colleges, the University of Pennsylvania had the highest percentage of Class of 2029 first-gen students, at 21%, followed by Harvard University at 20%, Columbia University at 19%, and Cornell University and Yale University at 18% each. Princeton University recorded 16.7% first-generation students in the Class of 2029, while Dartmouth College came second-to-last at 15%, and Brown University came in the rear at 14%.

Ivy Coach’s Assistance for First-Gen Applicants Seeking Elite College Admissions

If your child will be the first in your family to attend college and you’d like our assistance in optimizing their odds of admission to a highly selective school, fill out our complimentary consultation form to get started with us, and we’ll be in touch with an outline of our services led by a member of our team of former elite college admissions officers.