Will athlete recruitment for niche sports be under threat if the Supreme Court overturns race-conscious college admissions?

Written By Donna Meyer

Since reading Yale Law Professor, Justin Driver’s opinion that “Preferences for athletes in niche sports would seem to be one of the first items on the chopping block” in the New York Times, many fencing parents have anxiously asked if athlete recruitment for fencing would end should the Supreme Court overturn affirmative action in college admissions.

See: The Discrimination Suit Against Harvard

While colleges will certainly have to adjust how they go about identifying and admitting a racially diverse class should the Supreme Court, as widely expected, make race-conscious college admissions illegal, it is doubtful that niche sports recruitment will be axed as a result.

Mr. Driver’s premise is that since recruitment of athletes in niche sports advantages rich, white kids, nixing preferences for niche sport athletes would somehow help to rectify the racial diversity imbalance. Mr. Driver’s logic for nixing niche sports preferences is rooted in race, a rationale that would raise serious constitutional issues, and also potentially raise issues related to Title IX.

Any college daring enough to cancel niche sports preferences would find itself immediately subject to legal challenges that would drag on for years.

The elite colleges have several constructive pathways that they can take without resorting to actions that would be legally questionable, messy to implement and of marginal value in promoting diversity on campus.

In fact, the elite colleges, in anticipation of the Supreme Court’s decision, have for several years now, focused their efforts on alternative methods that have been effective at increasing campus diversity, and making it easier for low-income students to enroll:

  • Expanding their financial aid programs for low-income students, regardless of citizenship or immigration status. At the wealthier Ivy League colleges, students whose annual family incomes fall below $70,000 basically attend tuition-free.

  • Partnering with non-profits like Questbridge National College Match who connect high-achieving students from lower-income backgrounds with selective colleges and universities.

    For the Early Decision application round for the class of 2027, Questbridge successfully matched a record 1,755 students with one of the program’s 48 partner colleges.

  • Elimination of the enrollment deposit by 7 of the 8 Ivy League colleges, thus removing a financial barrier to accepting an offer of admission for low-income students.

There are many other good ideas that have been proposed but not yet implemented to give opportunity to low-income students of all races to attend an elite college. Except for Mr. Driver from Yale Law School, none of these ideas involve nixing niche sport athlete recruitment.

Donna Meyer

Donna is the founder of X Factor Admissions and the popular blog Fencing Parents , the single most important reference source for college bound fencers interested in athlete recruitment. In preparation of her sons’ applications to college, she spent years learning the intricacies of college admissions, consulted with a variety of admissions experts, and talked to admissions officers, NCAA coaches and many parents. She is a firm believer in data, and she uses it extensively to gain insight into the college admissions process. She sees that there is method in the madness.

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