The unexpected consequences of blind college admissions

January 21, 2026

The unexpected consequences of blind college admissions

The Trump administration's ban on diversity, equity and inclusion in college admission practices may be an end to the advantage men once enjoyed in the admissions process, journalist Jon Marcus said during a Jan. 14 fireside chat sponsored by the ABA Council for Diversity in the Educational Pipeline.

More than 70 attendees joined the program, "When Ending DEI Means Fewer Men: The Unintended Consequences of Blind Admissions," which was moderated by attorney Orla G. Thompson.

Following the Trump administration's decision last January to roll back diversity, equity and inclusion programs and initiatives through executive orders and agreements with individual colleges and universities, the public debate focused largely on race. Far less attention was paid to another long-standing admissions practice - the use of diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives to balance gender in entering classes.

The potential shift to colleges adopting gender blind admissions policies could portend challenges for men applying to college and potential problems for the colleges themselves, said Marcus, a writer for The Hechinger Report, a nonprofit, independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education, which published a report on men and college admissions in partnership with The Washington Post.

Marcus said women now outnumber men in college. "About 50 years ago, far more men than women went to college. Now it's almost 60 percent of women at the undergraduate level, and that's the national average. At individual institutions, the proportions are even more out of bounds."

He noted that women also outnumber men overall in graduate and professional schools. Women surpassed men in law schools in 2019. "All of these fields are now seeing the outcomes of this gender shift in higher education."

At the undergraduate level, "universities are very concerned about balancing gender on their campuses because they worry that if the genders become imbalanced that could work against them in recruiting students," Marcus said.

Marcus said "a loophole" in Title IX, the federal civil rights law, allowed gender to be considered in admissions. With significantly more women than men applying to college, using gender to balance enrollment occurs but is legal under Title IX, he said.

Marcus said there has been an even steeper decline in Black men in college. The University of California is working with colleges that have large Black and Hispanic student enrollments to attract more men to college, he said. "So, this affects men of any race but within that are categories...where the numbers are going down even faster," he said.

"We should just be concerned about somebody going to college," Marcus said, when asked if there should be more concern about men going to college than women going to college. "We need people to go to college, and right not there aren't enough people going to college to fill the jobs that require a college degree.

"Not everybody has to go to college ... but when you're seeing such a decline in half of the labor market - meaning men - that's a problem just in terms of headcount."