Tie college admissions to a random, unique identifier, and make it as blind to subjective opinion as possible. It could go through an intermediary that does have the personal information, but that gives the universities access to that identifier and only non-identifying information. Ask for motivational letters without as little personal information as possible (or no motivational letter at all), no picture, no name, no sex, financial status, nothing that’s identifiable to the people who have to evaluate the candidates.
The issue with this approach is that it further entrenches gaps that are already there. The best predictor of economic outcome is zip code. That’s because schools are funded by local property tax. Live in a wealthier area, get better schools. Better schools lead to a better outcome. Schools in poorer districts stay poorer. It’s a system that is self perpetuating.
Replacing affirmative action with something that is strictly income based could help but that ignores other systemic biases that are based on race rather that income.
I feel like if we’re ending affirmative action we should also put in place more restrictions on legacy admissions which is just affirmative action for dumb, rich kids and represents a much bigger chunk of students than affirmative action ever did.
