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Right now, high school seniors across the country are making one of the most important decisions of their lives to date. But considering the large increase in applications and strike down of affirmative action, inequalities in the college admissions process are becoming more evident.

Wealth has a large influence in the consideration of the top three criteria — essays, extracurriculars and SAT scores — for admission.

This privilege doesn’t exist for lower-earning districts. They don’t have the same access to tutors, exclusive extracurriculars or private college counseling as their wealthier counterparts do, fueling a far more corrupt college admissions process than initially meets the eye.

My high school, for instance, had one guidance counselor for a school of over 500 students. While other students were touring colleges, working on essays and researching, we were stuck fighting for an appointment. This left many students worthy of acceptance without the opportunity to adequately present themselves in their applications.

Even though more students than admitted fit the necessary criteria to advance into higher education nationwide, they won’t stand a chance without the counseling imperative to market themselves. The college process is meant to be a gateway for students of all backgrounds. When access to that process is stuck behind a paywall, though, many students fall victim to a corrupt and discriminatory process.

But technological advancements like artificial intelligence curb some of the inequality students face. If used correctly, AI could provide several opportunities to students worldwide that would otherwise be inaccessible.

There’s already been a large increase in the amount of AI-powered college support offered in the last year. Websites like CollegeVine, Athena and AdmitYogi can assist students with creating AI-generated college lists based on their interests and academic background, along with editing papers, preparing for interviews and comparing applicants.

For high schools without such secure financial standing, these programs might be the only gateway into application preparation.

When building an admitted class, colleges strive to select a student body that’s diverse and can intellectually stimulate the campus. But if all the applicants are judged on the same criteria, the admissions committees will inevitably favor more privileged demographics simply based on accessible resources.

Joe Zhao | Design Editor

With the correct use of AI, the college admissions process could become far more versatile by allowing students to show off their strengths in whatever medium suits them best.

For instance, alumni interviews are largely unrealistic because of the extreme amount of time it would take to interview all the applicants. By utilizing AI to simulate face-to-face interviews instead of alumni, the process would be streamlined and more accessible to all applicants due to eliminating the time constraint. This would also give applicants a chance to showcase other skills not transferable on a paper application or within a tightly-limited essay, which are areas weakened by a lack of resources.

AI can also mitigate the personal biases among admissions officers that many are cautious of and take into consideration the resources available to that student in conjunction with their personal challenges.

There’s also a debate as to whether AI would perpetuate biases, considering it gets trained using human data. If the data used to train the AI model is carefully selected and is constantly reiterated and monitored with human oversight, there shouldn’t be major issues.

AI could also only evaluate certain portions of the application for traits such as resilience and curiosity, not taking into consideration the emotion behind the writing. This could help mitigate bias as it isn’t coming into contact with personal details about identity.

AI use may further allow colleges to patternize how they’ve discriminated against certain groups in the past by evaluating and compiling the data of admitted students from past admission cycles.

This knowledge would help universities in course-correcting to maintain the diverse student body they’re hoping to achieve, especially after affirmative action’s 2023 dismantling. In addition, this knowledge would help universities in recognizing what groups require more outreach.

Some schools are already using AI for automated screenings and to filter out those who don’t meet a certain set of requirements, such as GPA or standardized test scores. I would argue this doesn’t solve, but rather perpetuates, the inequalities within the college admissions process.

If AI is used in a way that evaluates students beyond their paper applications, it can grant a more equitable process to underprivileged students. Universities can truly diversify its student body and provide higher education to students regardless of socioeconomic class.

The bottom line is the current college admissions process is riddled with red tape and insurmountable obstacles that only seem to fall away if the price is right.

Implementing AI can alleviate some of these barriers for disadvantaged students, transcending the influence of wealth and evening the playing field as they journey into their futures.

Ally Price is a freshman political science major. She can be reached at aprice09@syr.edu.

Published on April 30, 2025 at 8:32 pm