The Supreme Court’s decision to end affirmative action in college admissions has not so much settled a debate as it has begun a whole host of new ones. While Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard maintains that colleges and universities are not permitted to recreate their affirmative action regimes in the aggregate through other admissions methods, such as the personal essay, schools may still consider “an applicant’s discussion of how race affected his or her life, be it through discrimination, inspiration or otherwise,” in the words of Chief Justice John Roberts’s majority opinion. Similarly, nonacademic factors such as geographic location and socioeconomic status remain accepted grounds on which to consider applicants.

This obviously leaves ample room for subjectivity on behalf of colleges in orienting their admissions processes, including in directions that still prioritize racial status, leaving the future of the college admissions landscape rather unsettled.