In the mid-80s, Princeton faculty asked the University to admit 15% of the freshman class from applicants with top academic credentials. IIRC, that was defined as 1500 SATs and either a 3.75 or 3.8 GPA. At that point, only 7.5% of those offered admission had such credentials. University administrators turned the faculty down. At that point, there were still some all-male eating clubs (Sally Frank had filed the lawsuit challenging their legitimacy, but it wasn’t conclusively won until 1990.) It was a very WASPY, to the manor born place – and sports and drinking seemed to be held in higher regard by most undergrads than academics were. Over the past 15 years, the school has been under pressure to rethink the role of legacy admissions and one change has been the decision to treat the children of grad student alumns as legacies. The residential college system was brand new when I got there and didn’t go beyond sophomore year IIRC. So there have been deliberate attempt to change the demographics and reengineer the social environment at Princeton. The changes seemed noticeable when I’ve visited, but I haven’t looked at stats. The ISC program I commented on was a faculty initiative designed to find/train/encourage a cohort of budding research scientists (from within a sea of pre-meds) starting freshman year. It appears to have been very successful
Harvard has, in certain ways, stuck to its formula but expanded its reach and adapted to a changing world. Basically, it bets on future leaders and, back in the 1980s, that meant international students in the college where the children of foreign rulers or elites. And, of course, the Kennedy school had what we called the mid-career dictators program. These days, it seems as if there’s more of a sense that international undergrads are chosen based on their own accomplishments. There’s more attention to first-gen students than previously and the alumn base is more diverse now than it was then, which I think/hope has lead to better retention among AA undergrads than what I saw in the late 70s/early 80s. Harvard’s gender balance has also changed. My class (1982) was the first with equal access admissions for women. That meant more women than previously, but we were still outnumbered 2:1. Harvard has also taken more control over the House system (to keep each House inclusive, I think) and has closed one of its undergrad libraries. Faculty complain that schoolwork is increasingly taking a backseat to extracurriculars. Arguably, the new performing arts major is a reaction to that phenomenon. But Harvard is also adding an engineering school (when I was there, there wasn’t even a CS major yet).
I think a lot can change in 30 years or so and that “college” in the US has been continually changing over that period Different schools adapt in different ways – and some plans succeed and others don’t. And it’s a competitive market (albeit of a really weird sort), so everybody’s watching what other schools are doing.