A federal judge has extended the deadline for institutional members of six higher education associations – as well as a group of six independent colleges – to submit detailed applicant and admission data that the U.S. Department of Education is seeking to ensure the schools are not considering race in their admission decisions.
The schools were initially required to submit the data by March 18. The new deadline is April 24, U.S. District Judge F. Dennis Saylor ruled in a temporary restraining order he granted to the plaintiff schools. The temporary restraining order – one of several issued in the case – is meant to give the plaintiff institutions more time to brief the court on the matter while the case is pending.
The case concerns whether the federal government can compel colleges and universities to comply with a 2025 Education Department directive for institutions that receive federal aid to submit detailed data about their applicants and admitted students that is broken down by race and sex.
The bigger picture:
On August 7, 2025, President Donald J. Trump issued an executive order to revamp the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System, more commonly known as IPEDS, which is managed by the National Center for Education Statistics. The idea behind the order – titled “Ensuring Transparency in Higher Education Admissions” – is to give the federal government a way to check if institutions of higher education are complying with the Supreme Court’s 2023 ban on the use of race in college admissions.
A directive issued the same day by Education Secretary Linda McMahon spells out the information that colleges and universities are supposed to provide for the revamped IPEDS for the 2025-2026 school year. It includes data broken down by race and sex regarding applicants and admitted students’ test scores, GPAs, first-generation-college-student-status and other characteristics. It also orders the schools to provide information concerning their students’ graduation rates, final GPAs, financial aid offered and financial aid provided, also broken down by race and sex. Colleges and universities that receive federal student aid through Title IV are supposed to provide the information through a survey called the Admissions and Consumer Transparency Supplement, or ACTS.
