When Ronald Daniels became president of Johns Hopkins University, the institution had more legacy students in its freshman class (12.5 percent) than students who were eligible for Pell Grants (9 percent). Now those numbers are reversed—3.5 percent of students in this year’s freshman class have a legacy connection to the university, and 19.1 percent are Pell-eligible.

In this commentary, Daniels explains why his school ended legacy admissions and how that decision is helping qualified and promising students from all backgrounds move up the social ladder.

Photo: LA Johnson

The SAT has long been one of the most widely used measures in college admissions. But between a California lawsuit to stop schools from using the test in admission decisions and new University of Chicago research showing that grade-point average is a better indicator of college success than standardized test scores, future use of the SAT as an admissions tool may be in doubt.

Elissa Nadworny of NPR and Elaine Allensworth of UChicago Consortium discuss what might be next in admissions and what would be an improvement over standardized tests.