NYC colleges to pay fine for non-compliance of proposed bill

A bill which is set to be passed into legislation, sponsored by State Sen. Andrew Gounardes (D-Brooklyn) and Assemblywoman Latrice Walker (D-Brooklyn), targets the practice of giving children of alumni a leg up in college admissions — something critics say unfairly advantages already-privileged students.

The bill would prohibit New York colleges from using legacy preference or binding early decision programs in admissions.

The bill would also bar the use of “binding” early decision programs that require students admitted early to attend — an approach advocates say disadvantages lower-income students who need to compare financial aid offers from multiple schools before making a decision about where to go.

The bill would apply to both public and private colleges and would assess steep financial penalties to schools that don’t comply.

The legacy preference and binding Early Decision are essentially affirmative action policies for the wealthy,” said Michael Dannenberg, the Vice President for Higher Education at Education Reform Now, an advocacy group that supports the bill.

“By definition, families that benefit from legacy preference have already received a degree, and structurally, Early Decision favors those who don’t need to compare financial aid packages,” he said.

The proposed legislation would only bar colleges from instituting “binding” early decision programs that require acceptance to students to matriculate. Early application programs that don’t require admitted students to commit would still be allowed.

Colleges that don’t comply with the bill would be forced to pay a penalty equivalent to the cost of tuition and fees for 10% of the school’s full-time student body, according to the legislation. The money would go into the coffers of the state’s Tuition Assistance Program, which subsidizes college costs for low-income students.

The proposal will likely face stiff resistance from colleges. In Connecticut, private colleges including Yale and Fairfield University are pushing back against the effort to ban legacy preference, arguing it represents an inappropriate government intrusion into the colleges’ academic affairs.

Four New York colleges with legacy preference and binding early decision — Columbia, Cornell, Barnard, and Colgate — declined to comment on the proposal.

Gounardes, the bill’s co-sponsor, said the state legislature is well within its right to regulate private colleges.