Two major developments are occurring in college admissions that are having major impacts on Black and other marginalized students’ ability to gain admittance into college. A push to alter or eliminate affirmative action policies in education continues to work its way through the U.S. court system, with a major Supreme Court showdown over the policy coming up soon. If the conservative majority of Supreme Court justices rule against race-aware college admissions, millions of students of color could find it harder to gain access to higher education. Meanwhile, a different barrier to college access was unexpectedly taken down as a result of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic . Given the educational, psychological and logistical difficulties that COVID created, many colleges and universities have stopped requiring students to submit standardized test scores, such as the SAT and ACT. Now schools are reevaluating their test-optional or test-free admissions policies. MIT recently announced that...