Caltech, Ranked No. 1 by ‘U.S. News,’ Has No Black Freshmen

A university that has been basking in a top ranking has no black freshmen.

The California Institute of Technology -- which claimed the No. 1 spot in this year’s rankings by U.S. News & World Report -- is sorely lacking in racial diversity, according to a survey by The Journal of Blacks in Higher Education. “It turns out that people who rate colleges and shape educational opinion really don’t care very much about the state of racial diversity on a particular campus,” says the report, in the autumn issue.

Seven of the 520 applicants Caltech admitted were black, but none enrolled.

The journal studied the racial makeup of this year’s freshman classes at the top 27 research universities and the top 29 liberal-arts colleges, as determined by U.S. News.

Robert J. Morse, deputy director of data research for U.S. News, confirmed that the magazine does not include racial diversity in its criteria for ranking academic quality, partly because it’s difficult to assign a value to diversity. And for some colleges, he noted, racial diversity is not part of the mission.

David L. Goodstein, vice-provost of Caltech, said the university tries hard to admit black students, but that they typically opt for more diverse institutions.

“Caltech is hurt by not having every possible kind of student here,” he said.

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