DOJ Accuses OSU Med of Discriminating Against White, Asian Applicants

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In announcing the findings of its investigation into OSU Med, the Justice Department said it discriminated against White and Asian students in granting admission to its 2023, 2024 and 2025 incoming classes, in violation of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, as interpreted by a Supreme Court’s 2023 ruling, which prohibits discrimination based on race or national origin in federally funded programs.

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According to its findings, the Justice Department said OSU Med has practiced a “holistic approach” to admissions since 2011 to increase admissions of underrepresented minorities. While the school says it considers an applicant’s attributes, experiences and metrics, including GPA and MCAT scores, equally, federal lawyers allege it gives greater weight to attributes and experiences to favor Black and Hispanic applicants.

The Justice Department alleges that OSU Med also uses so-called Super Screeners, admissions reviewers who can see applicants’ race and ethnicity, to favor those groups. It said Black applicants with similar academic credentials had 7.7 times the odds of advancing to the interview stage as Asian applicants and 4.6 times the odds as White applicants in the 2025 admissions cycle. Hispanic applicants had 2.3 times the odds of being interviewed as White or Asian applicants with similar academic credentials, it said.

The department also alleges that OSU Med operates a so-called side door admissions process, allowing some applicants to bypass the initial screening and the standard admissions committee review. According to the findings, Black applicants who used this pathway were four times as likely to be admitted as White applicants with comparable academic credentials during the 2024 and 2025 admissions cycles, while no Asian applicants were admitted through it.

It also accused the school of using socioeconomic disadvantage scores as a substitute for race to favor underrepresented minority applicants.

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