For the past two years, the College had the second highest percentage of black students in the nation in any non-historically black college, trailing the University of North Carolina. "We're five percent African-American [this year], and that tends to be like everybody else," said Parker. "In other words, we've generally done much better than any ... competitive college in the United States in enrolling African-American students."
Surprisingly, a record number of African-American students applied to and were accepted into the College this year. According to Parker, there were two main reasons that black students decided not to enroll. "One was financial aid, and one was that the academic credentials of those applying were so high," he said. "Their SAT scores and academic credentials were the strongest ever. We overlapped with Harvard, Yale and Princeton more than before."
The problem, then, was not the number of acceptances but the number of black students who eventually matriculated. This will be one of the issues the admissions office focuses on this year. There are several aspects to this process: admissions, financial aid and the Diversity Open House weekend.
Although the College has no formal affirmative action policy, race is considered in an admissions decision. "You're permitted to consider race among other factors, but you have to read the file holistically so that in addition to race you have to account for socioeconomic background, opportunities the person has had, the educational attainment of their parents," said Parker. "You can't just give someone extra points."
The College does not adjust financial aid packages to encourage enrollment, but suspects that some other schools may be calculating need-based awards differently for black students. "I'm discouraged by the behavior of some of our peer institutions in terms of financial aid," said Parker.
However, the College has an appeal process through which students can have their financial aid award reviewed if they believe the College has miscalculated their need. "There were a significant number of African-American students who didn't come to Amherst because of financial aid, but they didn't appeal," said Parker.
The College plans to encourage more students to appeal their award decision. Administrators plan to publicly announce their disapproval of suspicious adjustments of financial aid at a national convention.
Finally, the College plans to continue the Diversity Open House, formerly known as the Students of Color Open House (SOCOH). A total of 180 students of color, along with low-income white students, will have the opportunity to attend one of two open houses, and spend three days at the College attending informational meetings, visiting classes and touring the campus.
Parker explained that the changes to the open house reflect the 2003 Supreme Court decision about admissions processes at the University of Michigan. "Because of the University of Michigan Court decision, we have included some low-income white students in the group," said Parker. "It is our judgment that what the Supreme Court was saying is, in essence, you cannot run events or programs exclusively for students of color, which I think is a good thing."
Parker will make a presentation to the board of trustees in October, and the Faculty Committee on Admission and Financial Aid has already met to discuss their plans for the upcoming year.
"I think that this is one of the most important things that the admissions office does and we're going to be working very hard this year to make sure the class of 2009 has higher percentages of African-American students," said Parker. "I've been very gratified by the support from the president, the support from the board and the support from the faculty. The College is determined to have a better year next year."