Admission professionals need to work harder to have the general public understand the multi-dimensional bases of our admission decisions and how we define quality. If we want ratings or surveys or descriptions of our student body to go beyond gender, race, age, test scores, and class rank, we are going to have to identify some objective and shorthand way to describe these other factors.
Geographic distribution is one.
Perhaps the number of high schools represented in our freshman class is another. The data collected at the time of registration for the SAT may be a good place to start looking for such factors that can speak to the diversity of our class without reference to race. Another area for investigation may be the Enrollment Planning Service data. The segments within each state were established by admission officers on the basis of known differences in applicants from these segments. It is both a privilege and a heavy responsibility to determine how this resource is to be allocated when we have more applicants who can be successful than we can accommodate.