Every August for the past two years, Corey Madison (CAS ’27), one of the coordinators for the 2026 New Student Orientation, has been assigned a new group of students to lead for the week before classes begin.
One of the things that has been most exciting to Madison is getting to introduce new students of all different backgrounds to the Hilltop.
“I’ve had international [students], I’ve had kids of every race, multiple different socioeconomic backgrounds,” Madison said.
Every new class of freshmen arriving at Georgetown has a new makeup of socioeconomic, racial, ethnic, and cultural backgrounds. The demographics of these students can give insights into the equity of Georgetown’s admissions, recruiting, and enrollment process.
In early April, Georgetown published its 2025-26 Common Data Set (CDS), a standardized dataset published annually by institutions nationwide, providing demographic and institutional data. The CDS gives information on application and admissions requirements, college completion rates, and the racial/ethnic breakdown of both the freshman class and the university as a whole.
The Voice analyzed this data and spoke to students and experts, diving into what these numbers mean for the community.
The breakdown
The Class of 2029 marks Georgetown’s second admissions cycle without race-conscious admissions, which the Supreme Court banned in the 2023 Students For Fair Admissions v. Harvard University (SFFA) case. Since the ban, racial and ethnic diversity has, on average, declined at elite private institutions like Georgetown.
However, Georgetown has proven to be an outlier.
In both years since, Georgetown’s share of white students in the incoming class has decreased, with a nearly nine-point decrease since the Class of 2027. When considering the data in terms of white versus non-white students, the student body’s share of students of color has increased, particularly with Asian and Hispanic/Latino students.
While the percentage of non-white students declined from 35.83% to 35.75% immediately following SFFA, that percentage shot up to 39.9% for the Class of 2029.
However, not every historically underrepresented group has seen the same trends: Georgetown’s population of Black or African American students has decreased just over one point from the Class of 2027 to the Class of 2029. In addition, the share of students identifying as two or more races has been cut almost in half.
There are some nuances of the data that are important to understand: international students (classified as anyone studying on a temporary, non-immigrant visa) are counted as a separate race and ethnicity.. Students who identify as Hispanic are reported only under “Hispanic/Latino,” even if these students identify themselves as multiple races. Additionally, Native Hawaiian or other Pacific Islander (NHPI) and American Indian or Alaska Native (AI/AN) students tend to be admitted to elite universities at disproportionately low levels, so major changes in their enrollment can appear from one student. For instance, while one AI/AN student enrolled in the Class of 2027, zero enrolled in the Class of 2028, marking a 100% decrease in AI/AN freshman enrollment.
Zack Mabel is the Director of Research at Georgetown’s Center on Education and the Workforce, which studies the connections between education and workforce demands, often focusing on the impacts of racial and economic factors on student outcomes. He explained that the SFFA ruling caused universities across the country to consider new ways to recruit and enroll diverse groups of students without directly considering race.
“I think it was a wake-up call to a lot of universities that they were going to need to be much more proactive and pull many different levers all at once in order to try to counterbalance the challenges that prohibiting the use of race-conscious admission practices set in place,” Mabel said.
In 2024, the year after SFFA, Georgetown began considering students’ eligibility for a federal Pell Grant (a government financial aid award given to students displaying exceptional financial need) in admissions. Consequently, the Class of 2028’s share of Pell-eligible students rose to 15%.
A university spokesperson told the Voice that Georgetown is committed to cultivating a diverse student body.
“We regularly review the university’s application process with the goal of making it as accessible as possible to anyone who may be interested in a Georgetown education,” the spokesperson said.
The CEW’s past research shows that class-conscious admissions practices, like giving a preference to Pell recipients, cannot fully replace race-conscious admissions in cultivating racial and ethnic diversity. However, Mabel said that Georgetown’s efforts may have been more successful because the admissions department has made targeted efforts in outreach to students from racially diverse backgrounds and in low-income communities, beyond just considering Pell eligibility.
“The critical missing piece here is, what have the admission rates looked like for these populations of students, not just what does the diversity of the enrolled class look like?” Mabel said. “More students of color could show up on campus if more students of those backgrounds are simply applying to Georgetown.”
Another key demographic is students whose race or ethnicity is unknown, usually meaning they did not report. This percentage of students almost tripled in the first year following SFFA, with 9.52% of the Class of 2028 unknown compared to just 3.31% of the Class of 2027. For the Class of 2029 this number decreased slightly to 7.87%.
This gap makes it harder to track the diversity of incoming classes, according to Mabel, because distributing this percentage of students among other categories could have dramatic impacts on demographic data. While he said that students not reporting could likely be students of color who are worried they may be disadvantaged in the application process, this remains unclear.
Black students see dips in enrollment
Georgetown’s percentage of Black students in the Class of 2029 fell to 4.41%, just over a one point decrease over the past two freshman classes. Black people make up 13.7% of the U.S. population, which means Georgetown’s percentage is significantly lower than the national demographics.
While the share of Black students in Georgetown’s freshman classes has decreased, Madison, who is also an advisory board member for Georgetown’s chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, said that he has confidence that the admissions office is trying new methods to recruit students from underrepresented backgrounds.
“They’re already doing as much as they can to combat the negative effects of removing affirmative action, and they’re very committed to keeping the school a diverse place,” Madison explained.
Madison said outreach is key to getting students of color to apply and commit to Georgetown. He highlighted Hoya Saxa weekend, hosted by the Center for Multicultural Equity and Access, which provides accepted students from diverse backgrounds with financial assistance to come visit Georgetown.
Asian students see increases, but grapple with complicated labels
More than 22% of the Class of 2029 identifies as Asian, marking an almost five-point increase from last year’s freshman class. Post-SFFA, Asian American enrollment has been a mixed bag at other elite private colleges, according to reporting by NBC News.
In admissions data, Asians are considered to be “overrepresented.” While they accounted for under 7% of the U.S. population in 2025, they often comprise between 15% and 40% of students at elite private colleges. This can lead to the assumption that all Asian students are advantaged in the college admissions process.
“Asians and Asian Americans are historically one of the overrepresented groups attending selective universities. But there are many different subpopulations within that group that are, in fact, historically underrepresented,” Mabel said.
The term “Asian American” itself can be too broad for many students filling out demographic information. The United Nations recognizes 48 different countries in Asia, the world’s largest continent.
Saniya Bhagwat (SFS ’28), co-chair of the Politics and Advocacy Committee for Georgetown’s Asian American Student Association (AASA), said that she didn’t resonate with the label of “Asian American” for a long time because it seemed too general.
“I specified that I’m South Asian, because I did not have the same cultural experiences and just general experiences as, say, my East Asian friends had,” Bhagwat said. “ For example, I dealt with some colorism growing up, and that is definitely part of my South Asian identity.”
In surveys like CDS, it can appear that Asians are generally privileged in the college admissions process. However, Bhagwat cautioned against that assumption. She argued that, like any other racial or ethnic group, Asians are diverse in their privilege and access to education.
“I also think because of the model minority myth and things like that, people tend to associate ‘Asian American’ with wealth and high levels of education,” Bhagwat said, referencing the false, but pervasive, idea that Asian Americans are inherently more intelligent and hardworking than other minority groups. “It’s important to remember that there are low-income Asian Americans.”
Additionally, while the U.S. Census created a new “Middle Eastern or North African” category for its questions on race/ethnicity in 2024, much of educational data, including the CDS, hasn’t caught up. Thus, students from those backgrounds are often forced to choose between identifying themselves as white, African-American, or Asian, which may feel inaccurate to them.
Mabel says that there are other surveys students fill out, like the Common Application, which Georgetown has joined starting with the Class of 2030. Such surveys allow students to provide much more detailed information on their race/ethnicity and show the full scope of their identity.
Share of Hispanic/Latino students more than doubles
The category of Hispanic and Latino students has seen the largest growth of any group, students starting at 4.5% in the Class of 2027, falling to 3.81% of the Class of 2028, and then increasing almost threefold to 9.38% of the Class of 2029. Yet, this still falls short of the 20% of Americans who identify as Hispanic/Latino.
Emilio Cazares Borbon (CAS ’26) is the president of Movimiento Estudiantil Chicanx de Aztlán, a cultural, political, and service group on campus. For Borbon, increased enrollment of Hispanic students is a positive sign.
“Seeing that there still is a strong Hispanic community that is increasing, in some way, makes me happy and excited that we are sticking together,” Borbon said.
Borbon is one of many students who chose not to select a race on his Georgetown portal. He explained that it can be complicated for some Latinos to choose how to identify themselves. The U.S. Census and other surveys consider Latino/Hispanic to be an ethnicity rather than a race, however, the CDS lumps race and ethnicity together. Thus, many who racially identify solely as Hispanic/Latino are told to answer “white” for their race and then check “yes” for if they are Hispanic or Latino, even though they may not self-identify as white. 20% of the U.S. population identifies as Hispanic/Latino ethnically as of July 2025, and 17.3% of those individuals selected “white alone” as their race.
Borbon said that following the ban on affirmative action, students may opt not to report their race/ethnicity to mitigate any chance of harmful racial bias.
While Borbon said that Georgetown is “doing something right” given the recent jump in Hispanic/Latino student enrollment, he also thinks that more should be done before students reach the college application process to ensure that students feel prepared to apply.
“Georgetown and every university is the finish line, especially for first generation students […] the problem is getting there,” Borbon explained. “I think there should be more efforts in elementary school, middle school, and high school, to give everyone the fair chance to apply to Georgetown or any other high-achieving school.”
A rise in international students despite visa troubles
Beyond racial and ethnic diversity, Georgetown’s CDS data on the Class of 2029 revealed that the proportion of international students in the freshman class increased by more than a point compared to last year.
This bucks significant national trends showing declining international student enrollment, largely due to the Trump administration’s new visa policies. From May to August of 2025—the peak period for student visa applications—97,000 fewer visas were awarded than the year before, leading to a 17% decrease in new international student enrollments nationwide.
“Georgetown is a prime example of the fact that there’s going to be quite a bit of variation across specific institutions in terms of how this is playing out,” Mabel explained. “We should never look at aggregate trends and apply those to the truth on each and every campus.”
One such student is Gavin Liu (SFS ’29), an international student from Shenzhen, China and Global Expo Chair for Georgetown’s International Student Association. As a freshman, he cannot compare current trends to previous years, but Liu did notice a change in acceptances in the private high school network he attended, BASIS International.
“This year, I think I am the first student to attend Georgetown, along with a few other BASIS students from different BASIS [schools] in China, and we’re the first group to come here,” he said.
Despite an increase in international students, Liu also said that the intricacies of citizenship and visas can sometimes obscure the community of international students. Many students may have green cards or U.S. citizenship but have been raised abroad, causing them to feel like “international students” despite not being viewed that way formally.
“A lot of my Chinese friends, they have green cards, but they would consider themselves as international because they’re Chinese—they were born and raised in China,” Liu said. “The percentage of international students, I don’t think, fully reflects how many actual internationals are here.”
Looking forward
Students say Georgetown’s initial progress on racial and ethnic diversity after SFFA is heartening. However, Mabel and others believe that there are still more ways Georgetown can continue to recruit a diverse student body.
“There’s recruitment, there’s the financial aid packaging, so that university is competitive with other institutions who are probably competing for the same set of academically qualified students,” Mabel said. “Then there’s investing in the on-campus resources and cultural experiences.”
Bhagwat emphasized the importance of resources and identity groups that allow students to see themselves and their culture represented on campus.
“I noticed when I came to Georgetown, ‘Oh my God, there’s so many organizations and opportunities for me to learn about other Asian cultures and engage in my own,’” Bhagwat said.
Mabel said that post-SFFA, Georgetown’s growing diversity could attract even more students from diverse backgrounds.
“When prospective students who are visiting look around and they realize, ‘There are students like me here, and I’m not going to be the outlier,’ it’s going to make it easier for students to choose to apply to Georgetown, and make it easier for students who are admitted to then ultimately enroll,” he said
