University of Minnesota faculty members are concerned about the Administrative Hiring Task Force. 

Provost Rachel Croson charged the task force to document and clearly explain the current hiring authority for center director positions at the University, without inclusion of academic freedom. 

The executive committee of the University’s chapter of the American Association of University Professors wrote to the task force asking members to resign. 

The task force, announced in July 2024 and officially charged on Nov. 25, 2024, was established in direct response to the  job offer to Raz Segal was rescinded after he said Israel’s military campaign in Gaza was “textbook genocide.”

The College of Liberal Arts interim Dean Ann Waltner offered Segal an academic position in the History department and a directorship position, as per CLA constitution’s hiring policy. Former Interim President Jeff Ettinger rescinded the offer. 

Former task force member Steven Ruggles said he disagreed with the decision.

“It seems to me that presidents shouldn’t get involved,” Ruggles said. “The idea that we’re going to be scared, that we can’t have somebody in that kind of position who is an expert on genocide and Holocaust studies, I mean that’s what the center does.”

Willam Jones, the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) University chapter president, said every position at the University requires academic freedom as a protection, including directorships. 

“It’s not simply an administrative position, but it’s an academic position. And therefore academic freedom is really important for that position,” Jones said. “The Center of Holocaust Studies considers really controversial and difficult questions.”

In a letter to task force members, the AAUP said the task force fails to “encompass the central issue of academic freedom.” Jones said he is deeply concerned that the task force may ignore this concept.

“It’s a little bit puzzling. The goals shifted somewhat, and it wasn’t clear why that happened,” Jones said. “I suspect that it happened because if it was going to take on academic freedom, then it would have a much bigger charge.” 

Despite no direct reference to academic freedom in the charge, Task Force Chair William McGeveran said it is still a part of the work being done. 

“A lot of the policies that we’re looking at have components in them, including our tenure policy,” McGeveran said. “It’s naturally coming to be part of the conversation when you assess the landscape. So it is coming up and it’s being discussed.”

Croson’s involvement in this committee is also alarming to some faculty members. She received a vote of no confidence in the CLA assembly in June. Michael Gallope, the vice-chair of the CLA Assembly, was pivotal in the no-confidence vote. 

“This doesn’t make any sense. If someone is the recipient of a no-confidence vote from the Senate because of something they did, it is improper for this individual to subsequently appoint a handpicked committee to reconsider what the Senate already deliberated,” Gallope said.

Gallope said the issue surrounding administrative hiring is crucial and is concerned the task force will not be thorough enough. 

“You can’t run a University if you are afraid of disagreement or controversy. It just doesn’t work,” Gallope said. 

There is concern that this task force should have been created in the University Senate through one of the numerous standing committees. McGeveran said because the task force’s charge is so specific, its role takes place outside of shared governance.

“It’s meant to be an opportunity to interpret the existing policy, it’s not writing any policies, but interpreting,” McGeveran said. “Shared governance is where you assess policies and change them. That’s not what we’re doing. This task force isn’t organized to make decisions.”

Despite that, former member Ruggles chose to step down from the committee on Jan. 13 over concerns of overstepping shared governance. 

“I am persuaded by the argument that the task force undermines the University’s system of shared governance,” Ruggles said. “The task force is an ad hoc arrangement that bypasses the Faculty Senate and the Senate Committee on Faculty Affairs.”

The task force was charged to provide a report by March. McGeveran said that is still the goal.

The University of Minnesota Board of Regents unanimously approved the Graduate Labor Union (GLU) collective bargaining agreement at a special meeting on Tuesday. The agreement was reached between the University and GLU members on Dec. 22.  

Vice President of Human Resources Ken Horstman introduced the agreement and said the bargaining process was complex. 

“GLU and the university bargaining team both put in a persistent and continuous effort to come to this agreement,” Horstman said. 

Both sides met for approximately 55 full days of bargaining or mediation sessions, according to Horstman. This agreement will impact 4,500 graduate agreements.  

The agreement sets the minimum pay rate to $27 an hour. It also guarantees annual wage increases, among other benefits. Union members will now receive three personal days each term and there will be an increase in healthcare benefits.

University President Rebecca Cunningham was present at the meeting and said she was enthusiastic about the agreement. 

“I know that this was a complex three-year agreement that has been negotiated, much to the credit of all involved,” Cunningham said. “Today really marks a new chapter in our relationship with graduate students, who play a vital role in supporting and advancing our public mission.”

Administrative staff were integral to the success of this agreement, according to Cunningham. 

Several regents spoke in support of the piece, including Regent James Farnsworth. 

“We talk a lot about workforce reinvestment here, this a very critical and tangible step towards workforce reinvestment, in that value that we’ve been prioritizing,” Farnsworth said. 

This agreement took effect on Jan. 13 with the first paycheck it will impact being on Feb. 5. The agreement is in effect until June 2027.

The State of Minnesota offers two ways for high school students to earn college credit for free: Post Secondary Education Opportunities (PSEO) and College in the Schools (CIS). Both are offered at the University. 

31% of students who participate in dual enrollment programs at four-year institutions re-enroll in the same university post-grad, according to data from Inside Higher Ed.

The class of 2028 at the University of Minnesota has 15% of its students enrolled in at least one form of dual enrollment at the University before starting their freshman year, according to the Director of Dual Enrollment Emily Hanson. 

The University’s Twin Cities campus has approximately 9,000 students participating in CIS across 145 high schools and between 600 to 800 students enrolled in PSEO classes. 

Hanson said there are more students in CIS because of the structure and flexibility of the program. CIS allows teachers to apply for the program and hosts classes in students’ high schools in the same classrooms as their other classes. 

There are fewer opportunities for PSEO students at the University as they register after all undergraduate students, so class offerings can be limited for them. CIS is built into regular high school schedules, Hanson said. 

The most commonly offered CIS course is the University’s freshman writing course. Hanson said that since it is a required writing course, students may want to have that requirement completed before entering college. 

Hanson said exposure to college coursework benefits students in the long run. 

“Students are starting a University of Minnesota transcript, but they’re also learning about college classes,” Hanson said. “They’re having an early exposure to university content, the challenges and the pacing of a university course in a safe environment.” 

There are 18 different foreign language courses offered for CIS students, the largest selection of any discipline. Liz Lake is the faculty coordinator in the Spanish language department and works with up to 30 high schools that offer Spanish courses each year. 

“They teach a curriculum that was developed at the University of Minnesota, and we provide them with assessments and rubrics and those types of things for their students,” Lake said. 

Coordinators in each of the seven academic departments work with the high schools to provide resources, according to Lake. 

“In terms of their professional development, we meet with them three times every year, they’re invited to campus, and we hold professional development workshops,” Lake said. “We also work on curriculum together, we bring in samples of student work, and we see that we’re all assessing at relatively the same level.”

The University also coordinates with guest speakers for teachers and students, most recently bringing in experts on AI and how it impacts languages. 

Lake said expectations are nearly the same between the high school and collegiate levels, including the expectation that professors speak in Spanish for at least 90% of class time. 

“For students who are engaged with Spanish, it gives them a higher level when they’re ready,” Lake said. “It allows you to continue with something that you’re passionate about at your school, and then you get college credit as well.”

Lake said the preparatory nature of the classes can also be helpful to students.

“High schools, for very good reasons, have models that are more flexible with students in terms of retaking exams and stuff that isn’t generally allowed at the university level,” Lake said. “So seeing that in action before you leave high school is also a benefit.”

All students in CLA are required to take at least two years of a language or pass the Language Proficiency Exam (LPE). Students taking CIS Spanish courses take the same LPE as those at the college level, fulfilling their language requirements before they arrive on campus.

“I think it’s a fantastic program, and I think as many connections that we can make between the high schools and higher ed is important, showing the relevance and also the fun of a college degree,” Lake said. 

Hanson said one of the overarching goals of the office is to provide students with the opportunity to succeed.

“We’re interested in exposing students earlier to college opportunities and demonstrating that they can be successful,” Hanson said. “When students see themselves as college students while they’re in high school, studies have shown they’re more likely to graduate high school, to go on to college, and also to persist in college.”

The University of Minnesota updated its Administrative Policy of Holds on Records and Registration, removing the minimum financial obligation previously held for students after the Biden Administration introduced several reforms focused on higher education. 

The previous minimum of $250 would have prevented students from graduating. The system-wide updated policy still explicitly states that violations of student conduct, academic integrity or disciplinary actions may result in the University withholding transcripts or a diploma.  

Amber Cellotti, the deputy registrar and interim director of the Office of the Registrar, said in an email to the Minnesota Daily this decision was made for several reasons. 

“The policy language was adjusted so that it no longer reflects the previous institutional practice of withholding transcripts and diplomas for students who owed a balance to the institution,” Cellotti said. “With the new federal regulations in place, we wanted to ensure that the policy language was reflective of new practices to provide transcripts and diplomas to students who owe a balance.”

All University policies are updated every four to six years, and the last revisions to this policy were in 2021. This change follows new federal regulations banning higher education institutions from withholding transcripts to students who use federal aid. 

The updated policy says the University may decline to release diplomas or official transcripts to students with unresolved debts to the institution until the student has made a plan with the University to resolve their financial obligations. The new policy directly involves each campus’ One Stop office.

The University’s policy is different from the federal regulation as it applies to all students, not just those with federal financial aid. 

“The University made a systemwide decision to extend this to diplomas to ensure equity among students who may need to present credentials in various formats, domestically and internationally,” Cellotti said. “The policy language is being updated as part of comprehensive review and to comply with federal regulations as well as reflect the practices that the institution has implemented as of July 1.”

This change began in the Senate Committee on Educational Policy this summer. The policy was introduced and voted on in the December Faculty Senate Meeting, where it passed. 

Jennifer Goodnough, chair of the Faculty Consultative Committee, said the updated policy introduces new resources for students, including information on how students can fix issues to receive their transcripts and links to the individual campus One Stop offices to help students with financial issues. 

“One thing I think is really good about this update to the policy is that every student knows where to go to ask a question if they aren’t sure how they can make a plan with the University to pay their bill. That feels more equitable and fair,” Goodnough said. “This means everybody has access to the information to get to their transcripts. The real value in the change is beyond just increasing access to the transcripts and to diplomas, it also means that all students have one place they can go and get that information.”

The policy will be discussed in the Policy Advisory Committee at the beginning of the spring semester and is expected to go into effect in the spring of 2025.

A new plan for general education requirements for the University of Minnesota Twin Cities was introduced at the University Senate meeting on Dec. 5. The new Core Curriculum would simplify the current liberal education requirements and add two new multidisciplinary courses for all students. 

The new program comes from a task force charged in 2022 by the Senate Committee on Educational Policy and Provost Rachel Croson. The project was led by Professors Kathryn Pearson and Will Durfee, who presented the plans. 

“The committee is really excited about the potential for undergraduates to have a more meaningful general education experience, moving away from what students have described as just checking boxes to a more integrative experience that gives them more agency,” Pearson said.  

Currently, all students must take seven diversified core courses — arts and humanities, biological sciences, historical perspective, literature, mathematical thinking, physical sciences and social sciences.

The changed core curriculum would require six foundational courses — scientific thinking, qualitative reasoning, the past and present, the search for meaning, societies, cultures and communities, and creativity and imagination. 

All students are also required to take one class on race, power and justice in the United States, and three other designated theme courses, which are civic life and ethics, the environment, global perspectives, and technology and society. 

The new requirements would include both a course on race, power and injustice in the U.S. and a global perspective course. These classes would be mandatory for all students. Students must also take three of the following “focus area” courses — equity, environment, civic life and well-being. 

Durfee and Pearson said there was plenty of feedback on the plans, and they collaborated with faculty and students for several months. 

“Students from across the University have generally expressed enthusiasm about this really allowing them to discover what they’re passionate about,” Pearson said. “They’re also excited about the potential of that signature course at the end, really allowing them to work collaboratively and show what they know.”

The curriculum also creates two new classes for all students. The one-credit multidisciplinary approaches course and the three-credit multidisciplinary synthesis.

The multidisciplinary courses will have professors from across the University interact with students, according to Durfee. It would focus on engagement between different departments and schools.

“This is not a class on how to do college. This is a class where students would have large format seminars from faculty across the University who are representing disciplines across the University and the four different focus areas,” Pearson said. “They would be supplemented with smaller discussion sections with an instructor who would guide them with writing and discussion and other activities.”

The program also reduces the writing intensive requirements to two upper-division writing courses, which removes the lower-level writing requirement in the current four writing course requirements. None of these plans would impact individual college requirements and would only apply to students on the Twin Cities campus.  

“The intent is the general education portion rises up to engage the students and have the students be passionate in the same way they are about their major,” Durfee said. 

Faculty members like Professor Eva von Dassow talked about concerns regarding the new structures. Foreign language requirements were a big concern for faulty members, alongside the logistics of how the plan would be implemented. 

“We don’t have a real core curriculum as it is. Instead, what we have now is a buffet of hundreds of courses that faculty have labored to get certified for one of a dozen broad requirements,” von Dassow said. “If this plan is adopted, we’d have to do it all over again for a more vacuous set of requirements that would dilute all the subjects we teach into vague catch-all buckets like the search for meaning.”

The proposal is still going through revisions and is expected to be reintroduced at the February Senate meeting. It will then be voted on at the March Senate meeting, and if passed, would be implemented for students entering the University in either 2027 or 2028. 

The Minnesota Center for Prion Research and Outreach (MNPRO) received $483,497 in federal funding to continue research on chronic wasting disease (CWD) in deer. 

The grant came from the U.S. Department of Agriculture Animal and Plant Health Inspection Services, according to a press release in November. 

CWD is a neurodegenerative disease affecting cervids such as deer, elk and moose across North America, said Stuart Lichtenberg, a research scientist with MNPRO. 

“It is incurable, untreatable and will always ultimately end up in the death of the animal,” Lichtenberg said. 

Lichtenberg said CWD attacks prions, or misfolded protein cells, that cause fatal brain diseases. Prions do not break down in the environment outside the body, meaning live animals can contract CWD without exposure to the infected animal. 

“The thing about these prions is they are extraordinarily resilient,” Lichtenberg said. “We’re talking persistence in the environment and retained infectivity for years to decades. So this creates a big issue because it means that even though an animal may have died years ago it could still infect other animals that are exposed to those prions that are in the environment.”

Tiffany Wolf, the co-director of MNPRO, said the center was created after the Minnesota Legislature contacted the University with concerns over the disease.

“Minnesota, I think, is a state that recognizes the value of our natural resources and the important connections we as citizens have with our natural resources, and deer and deer hunting are really an important part of that,” Wolf said. “It’s been exciting that our state is supporting our natural resources and protecting and conserving our natural resources.”

Lichtenberg said researchers can struggle to get funding, and MNPRO is unique in receiving state support.

“It’s rare that funding comes from a state-level source,” Litchenberg said. “Almost all of the research funding we get here at the University comes from federal sources. We’re very fortunate in Minnesota that we have a state legislature that’s willing to invest in research and issues like this because it’s not terribly common.”

Wolf said MNPRO has three main focuses — research, education and outreach. 

“We think it’s critically important for us to connect the latest and greatest science with the public,” Wolf said. “We want to do it in a way that is easy to understand for people who may not normally think about prion diseases, so a lot of our efforts engage with the public.”

The center works closely with the Leech Lake Band of Ojibwe and Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe, Wolf said.

“I’ve been working with tribal partners for a long time now, a lot of our work, both in research and outreach, is driven by the needs of our native communities,” Wolf said. “We have a lot of conversations with the tribal natural resource agencies that are thinking about chronic wasting disease.”

Outreach is a big part of the program, Wolf said. At the MN State Fair, MNPRO talked with 12,000 people, informing them of the disease. But Wolf said it is not only about informing the public.

“Oftentimes people think about outreach as a unidirectional process where you’re just sharing information, but you’re not really listening,” Wolf said. “If you take that approach, you’re not really taking in what communities need, I like this idea of a two-way process so that when we create that information, we can do so in a way that meets their needs.” 

Researchers are hoping to make progress and continue to explore the disease, Lichtenberg said. He is teaching a class in the Veterinary School focused on prions in spring 2025, furthering education on this subject. 

“The tricky thing with the disease is, they’re going to defy your expectations at every turn, and they have for years and years and years,” Litchenberg said. “This stuff has confused scientists for decades now, we’re still being surprised by things with the disease.” 

The takeover of Morrill Hall in January of 1969 led to systematic changes at the University of Minnesota. 

It has been 50 years since students protested for civil rights following the death of Martin Luther King Jr. in 1968, and its story is still impactful on campus.

Professor Emeritus John Wright was an event organizer and played a major role in the occupation. 

“In April 1968, the country exploded, major rebellions all across the country. More than 100 cities exploded,” Wright said. “So we as students met to decide how we could respond as a group constructively to the assassination and its aftermath. Our group leaders asked me to draft a response that we could then send on to the University administration.”

The demands were deliberated by former University President Malcolm Moos and a task force for eight months. Students felt they were not listened to. 

“We then concluded that the progress was totally unacceptable and that we had to take nonviolent direct action and occupy Morrill,” Wright said. 

Wright said students were frustrated with the administration. 

“At that point in time in this country, higher education was still segregated across the country, even though it’s in the so-called ‘Jim Crow free north,’ there were tiny pockets of black students in even these public universities all across the country,” Wright said. “Black students all across the country, confronting these institutions, public and private, north and south, for the long history of discrimination or white supremacy, in the academic world.”

The occupation lasted from 1:30 p.m. on Tuesday, Jan. 14 until 1 p.m. on Jan. 15 and led to the arrest of five individuals. In the end, protesters met with Moos and discussed their demands.

The University’s African American and African Studies Department (AA&A) was founded post-occupation. The AA&A department was founded in the fall of 1969, following the end of the occupation. Rose Brewer, who worked in the department since 1989, said the 1969 occupation had a lasting impact.

Brewer said Black students were not well represented on campus and “I’d say the curriculum was quite Eurocentric. Part of it was that universities had been disconnected from what was happening in communities, it was an ivory tower dynamic.”

AA&A offers a Bachelor of Arts in African American and African Studies and a graduate minor in Africa and the African Diaspora. Beyond those programs, one key element of the department is the language offering, which teaches Swahili and Somali. 

“The language program is an outstanding one, throughout the history of the department,” Brewer said. “Languages represent the student population. We have a large East African student population, and we offer Somali, which is an Eastern African language.”

The program has managed to maintain its presence on campus, an accomplishment that most programs of the same origins have not managed, Wright said. 

“Of the departments of African American African Studies and Black studies that were developed over the course of the two decades, and there were more than 400 of those programs, two-thirds of them died out,” Wright said.

The presence of the department is due to support from the University and its roots, Wright said.

“It’s part of the inherent legacy of the department and it informs what we do,” Brewer said.

Brewer said the legacy of the 1969 occupation is seen in today’s political climate and the recent Morrill Hall occupation on Oct. 21. 

In October, Wright received the University’s Outstanding Achievement Award, for his activism throughout the years. He said this fight did not begin in 1969 and certainly did not end in 1969. 

“The department is grounded in the history, we’ve certainly extended beyond that, but we are very aware of the political moment,” Brewer said. “Our department has students who have been involved in the political struggle currently. Just four or five years ago there was an uprising surrounding the George Floyd murder, so these issues are not just in a historical context, the legacy continues in the current moment.”

The University of Minnesota Senate failed to pass a resolution censuring the University’s police department (UMPD) for the detainment of Minnesota Daily reporter Tyler Church at a special University Senate meeting Nov. 15. 

The resolution, written by graduate student Chase Krug, called for UMPD to be held accountable for their actions during the Morrill Hall occupation on Oct. 21.

“This incident raises significant concerns regarding UMPD’s adherence to First Amendment rights,” Krug said. 

Church attended the meeting and spoke in favor of the resolution.

“I sit with you all today, not to lambaste the UMPD or the University of Minnesota,” Church said. “What I am here to do is to tell my story and pave the way for future student journalists here at the University.”

During the occupation, Church was held in flex-cuffs briefly and had his belongings confiscated. It took almost 48 hours to get his belongings back, including his laptop, reporting notes and other schoolwork. 

“All my life, I’ve wanted to become a journalist so that I could help amplify the voices of those struggling and get them help. On that day, I was told that what I do doesn’t matter,” Church said. “So, what I ask of you all is to consider the future of journalists here at the U, and understand that your vote could influence the future of many students. There need to be steps put in place to ensure that the events that occurred to me on October 21 never happen to another student journalist again on this campus.”

Church was cut off before he could finish his speech due to time restraints. 

The meeting was scheduled for 30 minutes, but several members of the senate felt that was not enough time. Votes to extend the meeting failed twice. 

The resolution was opened to the floor for debate, where representatives spoke for and against the resolution. 

Stacy Maher, the chair of the Civil Services Senate, said the resolution does not promote campus safety.

“I want to acknowledge some end goals — campus safety and campus security,” Maher said. “These are commonalities for all within our system, inclusive of civil service staff, some of which were working inside Morrill Hall on the day of the occupation. This resolution does not promote a culture of safety, it exposes a device of fissure within our University.”

Maher and professor Richard Graves were concerned about the potential conflict the resolution could create.

“I believe it will contribute to the continued fragmentation and division of the University of Minnesota community,” Graves said. “The goal is to build and strengthen relationships and bring communities together.” 

Other dissenting speakers questioned the need for this meeting to occur. 

Krug said the resolution formally reprimands UMPD and requests it investigate police officer’s’ training regarding the press. He added this legislation would be impactful for the University community.

Senators in favor of the resolution, like professor Nathaniel Mills, spoke on the importance of holding UMPD accountable and the severity of the police response to the Oct. 21 occupation.

“In her remarks to the Senate on the (Oct.) 24, President Cunningham justified sending in the police to break up the occupation, citing the chaotic circumstances and fog of war around the situation as explaining any brief or mistaken press detentions,” Mills said. “Despite having this period of no threat to safety for about an hour, the administration decided to have cops rush in and subdue everyone, protesters and press included.”

Other members refuted criticisms of the language and timing of the resolution.

Professor Teri Caraway said the bill was introduced at a critical time. 

“The question before us is whether we think it’s appropriate,” Caraway said. “If you think that that’s a good thing to happen, then you should vote against this resolution. If you don’t want that behavior to happen on our campus, then you should vote in favor of it.”

The resolution did not pass, with 59 members in support and 61 members opposed. President Rebecca Cunningham and Provost Rachel Croson were not present at the meeting.

The American Association of University Professors (AAUP) released a statement Oct. 14 to the University of Minnesota on the revocation of Raz Segal’s job offer.

AAUP Director Todd Wolfson condemned the revocation, calling it a violation of academic freedom. 

The University of Minnesota Twin Cities AAUP Chapter President William Jones said the statement is a powerful message and hopes it will convince administration to make changes.

“I think the statement sends a message that what happened was a violation of these core principles,” Jones said.

Nathaniel Mills, a University professor and AAUP member, said the AAUP is an expert on academic freedom and is influential across campus.

“The president of the University has no constitutional authority, according to the Board of Regents policies which govern the U, to override a hire like this,” Mills said. 

Given the current politicization, Mills said it is essential that faculty speech be protected. 

The University’s Center for Genocide and Holocaust Studies has had an interim director since 2021. The hiring process for a new director was done by a committee of faculty in the College of Liberal Arts (CLA). 

They released their recommendations in June and offered Segal the job. 

“Part of that decision is based on his experience,” Jones said. “He’s a world-renowned scholar of genocide.”

Segal released a statement in October 2023 saying the situation in Gaza is “textbook genocide.” Ettinger revoked Segal’s job offer June 10 after several complaints from community members.

“The purpose of the search was to hire somebody who is an expert on genocide,” Jones said. “The people who were best prepared to make a decision were other faculty members who study similar issues.”

The AAUP is concerned with how Ettinger handled Segal’s hiring process and the precedent it set for controversial speech in academic settings.

“He’s (Ettinger) not a historian, he’s not in a position to decide whether Raz Segel was the right person for this position. He made this position purely on political grounds, which is sort of a classic cut-and-dry case of a violation of academic freedom,” Jones said.

The CLA constitution states the college dean is responsible for hiring and does not require the approval of the President or Provost. 

The faculty senate voted no-confidence in Ettinger and Provost Rachel Croson this summer. 

“The fear that me and my colleagues have is it would be very difficult for a scholar, regardless of their political views, to comfortably accept the job with this precedent,” Mills said.

In an emailed statement to the Minnesota Daily, President Rebecca Cunningham said the University plans to create a task force focused on academic freedom and hiring policies in response to the situation. 

“Academic freedom is cornerstone to our success here at the University of Minnesota, and so our goal is to have a faculty-led committee in place by January so that they can convene this important work,” Cunningham said.

California banned legacy status as a factor in college admissions in September, the largest state to do so yet.

This follows the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn affirmative action in 2023, which raised concerns over legacy students in higher education. Minnesota’s legislature introduced a similar bill last year.

Legacy admission policies give an advantage to applicants who are related to alumni, according to the Institute for Higher Education Policy.

Minnesota State Senator Clare Oumou Verbeten (DFL) introduced a similar bill in the 93rd session in spring 2024. 

“No public or private institution of higher education shall provide any manner of preferential treatment in the admissions decision to any student applicant on the basis of a student’s legacy status or a student’s familial relationship to any donor to such institution. The Board of Regents of the University of Minnesota is requested to comply with this section,” according to the Minnesota state legislature.

The bill was brought to the higher education committee on Feb. 29 but did not appear on the senate floor. At this time, it is unknown if the bill will reappear in the upcoming legislative session.  

California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed the bill banning legacy status in college admission, which will go into effect in the fall of 2025, and impact the following year’s admission process. In a press release, he stated the reasoning behind the bill.

“In California, everyone should be able to get ahead through merit, skill and hard work,” Newsom said in the press release. “The California Dream shouldn’t be accessible to just a lucky few, which is why we’re opening the door to higher education wide enough for everyone, fairly.”

The University of California system is the largest in the country with 295,000 students enrolled in 2023. Beyond the public institutions, California has several large private universities, including Ivy League Stanford and The University of Southern California (USC). USC has a 13% acceptance rate, while Stanford has a 4% acceptance rate.

California’s bill would apply to all colleges, not just private institutions, a shift that more states may be adopting. Virginia, Colorado and Connecticut have all introduced legislation regarding legacy admissions, but California is the second state to ban legacy admission for all institutions, following Maryland in February 2024.

The largest freshman class in the University of Minnesota history was in 2024 with 7,391 students. The University has not considered legacy status in its admissions process since 2023. 

Legacy admissions have been excluded from the University since they changed their admissions program in 2023. Their holistic admissions process has been in use for over 20 years but was updated in 2023, according to their website. 

The admissions process is split into two categories: academic factors and context factors. Academic factors consist of GPA, coursework and optional ACT/SAT scores. The context factors include participation in extracurricular activities, commitment to community service and evidence of personal accomplishment that is not demonstrated through other data. 

Affirmative Action was a protection created by a 1978 Supreme Court case that set the foundation of race in college admissions. Affirmative Action has roots beginning with Brown v. Board of Education and The Civil Rights Act of 1964 and was contested several times in court before being repealed in 2023.

Following the repeal of Affirmative Action, the University updated its holistic admissions process, which made it clear that legacy has no impact on admissions. 

“Our holistic review takes into consideration the individual circumstances that make each individual student unique,” according to the University Office of Admissions website.