Students for Fair Admissions, Inc. v. President and Fellows of Harvard College et al

Filing 419

DECLARATION re 417 MOTION for Summary Judgment by President and Fellows of Harvard College. (Attachments: # 1 Exhibit 1, # 2 Exhibit 2, # 3 Exhibit 3, # 4 Exhibit 4, # 5 Exhibit 5, # 6 Exhibit 6, # 7 Exhibit 7, # 8 Exhibit 8, # 9 Exhibit 9, # 10 Exhibit 10, # 11 Exhibit 11, # 12 Exhibit 12, # 13 Exhibit 13, # 14 Exhibit 14, # 15 Exhibit 15, # 16 Exhibit 16, # 17 Exhibit 17, # 18 Exhibit 18, # 19 Exhibit 19, # 20 Exhibit 20, # 21 Exhibit 21, # 22 Exhibit 22, # 23 Exhibit 23, # 24 Exhibit 24, # 25 Exhibit 25, # 26 Exhibit 26, # 27 Exhibit 27, # 28 Exhibit 28, # 29 Exhibit 29, # 30 Exhibit 30, # 31 Exhibit 31, # 32 Exhibit 32, # 33 Exhibit 33, # 34 Exhibit 34, # 35 Exhibit 35, # 36 Exhibit 36, # 37 Exhibit 37, # 38 Exhibit 38, # 39 Exhibit 39, # 40 Exhibit 40, # 41 Exhibit 41, # 42 Exhibit 42, # 43 Exhibit 43, # 44 Exhibit 44, # 45 Exhibit 45, # 46 Exhibit 46, # 47 Exhibit 47, # 48 Exhibit 48, # 49 Exhibit 49, # 50 Exhibit 50, # 51 Exhibit 51, # 52 Exhibit 52, # 53 Exhibit 53, # 54 Exhibit 54, # 55 Exhibit 55, # 56 Exhibit 56, # 57 Exhibit 57, # 58 Exhibit 58, # 59 Exhibit 59, # 60 Exhibit 60, # 61 Exhibit 61, # 62 Exhibit 62, # 63 Exhibit 63, # 64 Exhibit 64, # 65 Exhibit 65, # 66 Exhibit 66, # 67 Exhibit 67, # 68 Exhibit 68, # 69 Exhibit 69, # 70 Exhibit 70, # 71 Exhibit 71, # 72 Exhibit 72, # 73 Exhibit 73, # 74 Exhibit 74, # 75 Exhibit 75, # 76 Exhibit 76, # 77 Exhibit 77, # 78 Exhibit 78, # 79 Exhibit 79, # 80 Exhibit 80, # 81 Exhibit 81, # 82 Exhibit 82, # 83 Exhibit 83, # 84 Exhibit 84, # 85 Exhibit 85, # 86 Exhibit 86, # 87 Exhibit 87, # 88 Exhibit 88, # 89 Exhibit 89, # 90 Exhibit 90, # 91 Exhibit 91, # 92 Exhibit 92, # 93 Exhibit 93, # 94 Exhibit 94, # 95 Exhibit 95, # 96 Exhibit 96, # 97 Exhibit 97)(Ellsworth, Felicia)

EXHIBIT 59

ADDENDUM ON THE COLLECTION AND REPORTING
OF DATA ON RACE AND ETHNICITY

As noted in the Western Interstate Commission for Higher
Education report, "Knocking at the college door," December 2012, the
changes required in recent years by the federal government in the
reporting of race and ethnicity have produced a good deal of confusion
among those seeking to understand demographic trends: "Beginning in
2010-11, the last year for which we obtained enrollment data...,states
and institutions were required to report data...according to a new
methodology_"
"The new reporting scheme requires individuals to answer a twopart question to indicate their racial and ethnic identity. The first
question is whether an individual's ethnicity is Hispanic/Latino or
not. The second question is whether the individual is from one or
more of five racial groups... In addition to the new options for racial
and ethnic self-identification, the process for collection of data
from individuals is different than the reporting of the data to the
Department of Education: individuals may self-identify as both
Hispanic and any combination of races, but an individual who is
Hispanic will only be reported as Hispanic. Also, individuals are not
offered the choice of choosing the seventh category, Two or More
Races: rather it is a reporting category derived from the
individual's selections. These factors may account for some
divergence in data across the years that cover the transition from one
reporting scheme to another."
The report indicates that "...There is still only very limited
empirical research into the effects of these reporting changes,"
speculating that the Hispanic population may increase, while others
might decrease.
While complying with the new federal reporting requirement,
Harvard also continues to report in other contexts the data based on
students' actual responses to the optional application question. In

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particular, Harvard and many peer institutions count students in all
racial/ethnic/categories they marked.
The federal reporting system known as IPEDS (Integrated
Postsecondary Education Data System) has been used by Harvard and all
other institutions well before the recent changes. IPEDS has always
employed a reporting method different from Harvard's and those of many
other institutions. The use of yet another method has been confusing
for researchers and others interested in ethnicity. That confusion has
been exacerbated by a reporting paradigm which at times included
Harvard Extension School numbers with those of the College.
As one illustration of the challenges posed by these two
reporting regimes, the IPEDS compilation practices have sometimes
inadvertently led to a public perception that the number of Harvard
College students awarded a Pell Grant (a federal grant for low-income
students) was significantly lower than it actually is. Because of
IPEDS joint reporting of combined data from Harvard College and the
Harvard Extension School (including hundreds of students not seeking
degrees), it has been inaccurately reported in the media that only 11
percent of College students benefit from Pell Grants, when the
accurate percentage is 17.
This challenge is doubled with the reporting of data related to
student race and ethnicity. The IPEDS reporting system leads to
significantly underreported percentages for all ethnicities except
Hispanic Americans. The method used by Harvard and many peer
institutions gives a more complete report of the way many students,

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especially those of mixed heritage, actually view their racial and
ethnic identities.
For instance, for the class of 2016 (which entered Harvard in the
fall of 2012), IPEDS reports that 18.7 percent were Asian American,
6.7 Black or African American, and 11.1 percent Hispanic American.
However, these statistics are misleading in two ways. First, they do
not reflect the variety of ways in which our students may have selfidentified. Second, these numbers include undergraduates enrolled
full-time at both Harvard College and at the Harvard Extension School.
Many readers, not knowing this fact, often assume inaccurately that
they represent only students at the College.
Looking only at Harvard College and counting all the ways in
which our students self-identified, we report statistics in those same
three ethnicity categories as 22.4 percent Asian American, 9.3 percent
Black or African American and 9.3 percent Hispanic. In short, selfidentified Asian Americans and African Americans make up a
significantly greater portion of Harvard College's class of 2016 than
reported by the federal government.
We mention these various reporting mechanisms for race and
ethnicity to demonstrate how difficult it can be for the Western
Interstate Commission for Higher Education to project the demographics
of future high school graduates in the U.S. We hope that future
reports will help to clarify the complex and, at times, confusing data
that are used to envision the very different racial and ethnic future
of our nation.

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