Legacies Have Leg Up in College Admissions

Ever wonder about legacy preferences in college admissions?  Richard D. Kahlenberg’s book “Affirmative Action for the Rich: Legacy Preferences in College Admissions” examines legacy admission practices at a number of institutions including Brown, Princeton, Harvard, Penn and Dartmouth.
The Choice blog, a feature of The New York Times, explores the issue and cites Mr. Kahlenberg’s research from Princeton showing that “being the child of an alumnus adds the equivalent of 160 SAT points to one’s application (using the traditional 400-to-1600-point scale, and not factoring in the new writing section of the test) and increases one’s chances of admission by almost 20 percentage points.”
Richard D. Kahlenberg’s book Affirmative Action for the Rich: Legacy Preferences in College Admissions can be ordered through Amazon.com.
The Choice blog, with more details from Richard D. Kahlenberg’s book, can be found at:  http://thechoice.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/09/23/legacy/ and  http://thechoice.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/09/30/rich/