DEI Monitoring in College Admissions Data Challenged by States

The Education Department unlawfully changed a national university reporting system to track how much race and sex is considered in the college admissions process, over a dozen states said in a new lawsuit.

The Trump administration converted the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System from “a reliable tool for methodical statistical reporting to a mechanism for law enforcement and the furthering of partisan policy aims,” according to a Wednesday complaint filed in the US District Court for District of Massachusetts.

Colleges, universities, and technical and vocational institutions that participate in federal student aid programs report annually on financial information, enrollment, outcome measures, and more to the department’s National Center for Education Statistics.

The center is statutorily required to collect, analyze, and report educational information in a manner that is “free of partisan political influence and racial, gender, or regional bias,” the complaint said.

In tandem with an August 2025 presidential memo, Education Secretary Linda McMahon announced that higher education institutions will have to “report data disaggregated by race and sex relating to applicant pool, admitted cohort, and enrolled cohort at the undergraduate level and for specific graduate and professional programs,” the complaint said.

Responses to the new survey, IPEDS Admissions and Consumer Transparency Supplement, or ACTS, are due March 18, a tight deadline for schools to collect an “unprecedented array of information” that goes back six years, according to the complaint.

Institutions of higher education, or IHE’s, “face an untenable dilemma: quickly compiling data they typically would have years to collect and submit, all the while knowing that the data may suffer from inconsistencies given the haste with which it has been prepared and the lack of guidance from the Department of Education on what key definitions and data elements mean,” the complaint said.

They claim that, based on what President Donald Trump wrote in his memo, the data will be used to monitor whether schools are complying with the US Supreme Court’s 2023 decision in Students for Fair Admissions Practices, Inc. v. President & Fellows of Harvard Coll.

“Should IHEs fail to complete the survey—or complete it in a fashion the Defendants deem incomplete or unsatisfactory—they may face fines and the risk of losing federal funding essential to their operations,” the complaint said.

Harvard University is already facing backlash for its refusal to provide the Trump administration applicant-level admissions data. The Justice Department sued the university in February for allegedly withholding documents requested for a federal investigation ensuring SFFA compliance.

The states—including Massachusetts, California, New York, and Connecticut—allege the IPEDS changes are arbitrary, capricious, and beyond the department’s statutory authority in violation of the Administrative Procedure Act. They also assert that the new survey requirements could hinder IHEs’ student privacy obligations under federal and state law.

The complaint seeks to stay the implementation of the amended IPEDS survey and enjoin the department from compelling IHEs to complete that survey.

A spokesperson for the Education Department didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

The case is Massachusetts et al v. Department of Education et al, D. Mass., No. 1:26-cv-11229, complaint filed 3/11/26.