Alexis Lam, Contributing Photographer

Since the end of affirmative action, Yale’s cultural centers have been pushing to increase outreach and enhance diversity on campus in an effort to maintain a high yield of students from marginalized communities. 

In response to the Supreme Court’s decision, Yale allocated additional funding to its cultural centers to maintain diversity in the student body. The cultural center directors outlined plans to support students, and affinity groups emphasized ongoing efforts to enhance campus diversity.

“I’m glad the work we do at the cultural centers year-round with support from our amazing students has resulted in the percentage of students who identify as members of a racially minoritized group either holding steady or increasing slightly,” Joliana Yee, director of the Asian American Cultural Center, wrote to the News.

While enrollment for Asian American students decreased from last year’s 30 percent to 24 percent this year, enrollment of both Black or African American students and Native American students remained the same. 

Latine enrollment increased by one percent, reaching the highest-ever 19 percent. 

Eileen Galvez, directora of La Casa Cultural, noted that the increase in Latine enrollment throughout the years is “no coincidence,” as Galvez said that “La Casa at Yale is the largest Latine cultural center in the country.”

“This space, our student organizations, our committed staff, including Student Coordinators, Graduate Assistants, Peer Liaisons, and general support from our faculty, staff, and alumni, as well as relations with our New Haven neighbors, has uniquely positioned us to foster a warm, dynamic, and supportive environment for Latine students at Yale,” Galvez wrote to the News. 

Burgwell Howard, dean of student engagement who also oversees the cultural centers, told the News that he knew that Yale wouldn’t have the drop-off in racial diversity other colleges had.

He attributed the increase and maintained yield rates for incoming classes to the efforts of Yale’s cultural centers. Howard also shared that among other selective peer colleges, Yale’s cultural centers were a differentiator for many students he heard from.  

Yee wrote that the drop in the enrollment percentage of Asian American students, while “slightly disappointing,” maintains a higher enrollment than the class of 2022. She said that the drop was “unsurprising” since, according to Yee, Asian Americans have been a beneficiary of race-based affirmative action in college admissions and have been experiencing record-high Yale College admissions numbers every year for the last five years. 

Matthew Makomenaw, director of the Native American Cultural Center, shared that the mission of the NACC is to create a space for everyone on campus, to learn and understand Native and Indigenous issues and events and to continue to create an “Indigenous student-ready” university.

Anh Nguyen ’26, co-moderator of the Asian American Students Alliance, shared with the News that although the percentage of Asian American students did not significantly change, she is worried about the future impact of the Court’s decision on other ethnic and racial groups’ enrollment. 

“I’m grateful that Asian American enrollment didn’t decline much at Yale this year,” Nguyen wrote. “But I’m concerned about future admissions cycles and what discontinued affirmative action policies mean for our Black, Hispanic/Latino, and Native peers.”

To support the cultural centers directly following the end of affirmative action, Yale allocated additional funding to the four cultural centers and their associated student organizations. 

“Given the Supreme Court decision about affirmative action, which took place a little over a year ago, we took a number of actions to try and enhance and maintain diversity in the student body, and among those was additional funding to the cultural houses,” Yale College Dean Pericles Lewis told the News. “Partly in order to help them with their job of supporting diverse communities, but also because there hadn’t really been an update in the funding formula for a few years.”

Lewis did not share how much additional funding each center received.

Makomenaw shared that though funds have increased for the center, their approach to “try different things and try new things” to continue serving the diverse needs of students hasn’t changed.

Galvez also attributed a maintained yield to the efforts of La Casa throughout their La Bienvenida first year event, which targets the “language-flexibility” needs of some Latine households. Galvez mentions that with events like such, they hope to “establish and maintain trust with the loved ones of our students.” 

Nguyen shared that peer liaisons, who connect first years with the University’s four cultural centers, have been instrumental in helping incoming students find community and “feel at home at Yale.” 

However, Nguyen added that outreach was somewhat limited this year as only students who answered the optional race question sent by Yale College after decisions could get connected to their respective cultural centers.

Galvez said that keeping up with student and center needs has become a challenge and hopes that both financial and human resources for all of the cultural centers are part of Yale’s short and long-term strategic plans to keep supporting the cultural center’s work.

Yee wrote to the News that the AACC will continue to create ways to support students on campus and the exploration of their identities.

“The AACC will continue to do work that furthers our mission of building a dynamic Asian and Asian American presence at Yale by creating culturally affirming programming and educational opportunities for students to engage in ongoing exploration of their identities just as we have prior to the end of affirmative action,” Yee wrote.

Makomenaw shared similar goals and told the News that the NACC will continue to be “open, inclusive and meet the needs of all students related to Native and Indigenous knowledge, people, culture, history.”

Nguyen shared that AASA will continue to help Asian American students transition to Yale and supports policies that can work around the Supreme Court’s decision.

“Our fight for affirmative action is not just one for our Asian American peers, but one for other marginalized/minoritized groups that have historically been in solidarity with Asian Americans and cracked open the door for our own community to be able to enter institutions of higher education like Yale,” Nguyen wrote to the News.

Yale has four cultural centers.