Do legacy applicants receive preferential treatment in the Columbia University admissions process? Much like its elite university counterparts, Columbia notoriously gives an admissions edge to legacy applicants. But just how does Columbia define a legacy?

How Columbia Defines Legacy Status

Columbia Undergraduate Admissions very helpfully lays out its definition on its website: 

“Does Columbia give preference in the admission process to applicants whose parents attended Columbia?

We are always pleased to receive applications from students whose family members have graduated from Columbia. When an applicant is competitive and compares favorably with other similarly talented candidates, being a ’legacy’ candidate may be a slight advantage in the admission process. A ’legacy’ candidate is defined as the child of a Columbia College or Columbia Engineering graduate.”

Unlike some other Ivy League schools, such as the University of Pennsylvania, Columbia does not give the children of graduate school alumni legacy status. Of course, giving the children of undergraduate alumni exclusive claim to legacy status just further entrenches the unfair privileges of certain wealthy families who have called Columbia their alma mater for generations.

Why Legacy Status Should Be Phased Out at Columbia

Ivy Coach has decried the unfairness of legacy admissions in the Ivy League for many years. Legacy applicants are overwhelmingly white, wealthy, and the recipients of a lifetime of privilege. Of course, many of them are academically-distinguished and capable of being admitted to Columbia in their own right. But as increasingly competitive admissions cycles continue to drive Columbia’s acceptance rate downward (only 3.93% of applicants were accepted into the Class of 2027, though we anticipate the acceptance rate will rise for the Class of 2028 due to the school’s abominable response to rampant antisemitism), there is no excuse for a lesser applicant with legacy status to take the place of a well-deserving applicant who did not grow up with such a privilege.

With the power of Affirmative Action curtailed last summer, students and activists across the country have called for an end to “affirmative action for the rich,” i.e., legacy status and other admission privileges, which appear even more unjustifiable in the current campus climate (although, don’t be fooled, institutions like Columbia will still covertly use race-based admission criteria). Such calls to end the practice have made their way to Columbia’s campus. In October 2023, the Human Rights Center at Columbia published an op-ed in The Columbia Spectator decrying legacy preference and directing students to an open letter co-signed by fifteen student groups demanding an end to the practice.

However, we at Ivy Coach have a saying: where Harvard goes, the rest of the Ivy League follows! Until Harvard takes action on the issue, our famously accurate crystal ball tells us that Columbia will continue to drag its feet.

The Path Forward for Columbia’s Admissions Process

The Ivy Coach Solution to Columbia’s legacy admission woes is two-fold: do away with the admissions boost given to children of alumni but protect the admissions boost given to the children of major donors. Children of major donors, i.e. “development cases,’’ only make up a slim proportion of any given cohort, and giving them an admissions boost ensures that Columbia’s generous financial aid program will not be jeopardized by disgruntled donors who pull funding because their child was denied. It sounds far fetched, but as Columbia’s horrific response to antisemitism on its campus has demonstrated, donors are responsive to campus policy.

In April of this year, major Columbia donor Robert Kraft pulled his support from the school in reaction to campus turmoil. Imagine the reaction that doing away with development preference would elicit! For better or for worse, donors are here to stay. Columbia’s accessibility to low-income students should not be gambled with a policy that does not enshrine a development admissions preference. Legacy admission preference, on the other hand, is a vestige of a time long gone, and should be phased out immediately. We at Ivy Coach thus call upon Columbia and every other highly selective university across the land to take the leap of faith into a future that is more equitable, diverse, and forward-thinking!