Four years ago, Cornell didn’t seem to care if prospective undergraduates were fabulously wealthy. This was good for me, because I was not. Nor am I now, in spite of a two-year stint as a highly paid employee at Olin Library. I was fortunate the undergraduate admissions process was completely need-blind, with no regard for family income or potential building donation. Current applicants may not be so lucky.

Four months ago, the University announced it would be expanding the class of 2013 by 100 students in response to the ubiquitous “financial crisis.” This, I thought, could only mean one thing: 100 more wealthy students to help offset our school’s endowment losses.

Cornell told me I was wrong. In an e-mail, Doris Davis, the head of the University’s admissions office, assured me the admissions process is still “100 percent need-blind.” No preference for the rich and famous. Lenin would be proud.

Or so it would seem. In spite of the University’s protestations, a closer look at this year’s admissions numbers may tell a different story about what went down. For the class of 2013, Cornell accepted 1,249 students early decision, up by more than 100 from a year ago. Until this year, early decision acceptances had remained relatively stable, increasing slightly from 1,109 in 2005 to 1,139 in 2006 before falling back to 1,101 in 2007. Not surprisingly, as early decision numbers went up, regular decision numbers went down — from 5,629 last year to 5,318 for the incoming class, according to The Sun’s calculations.

In a year that will see the expansion of the freshman class by 100 students, it is a curious coincidence that Cornell has chosen to accept such an unusually high number of applicants early decision. Even when factoring in the increase in expected class size from 3,050 to 3,150, the number of early decision admits represents more than 39 percent of the incoming freshman class; in years past, that proportion has been closer to 36 percent.

There are no assurances that early decision applicants have more money than anyone else. But there’s a good chance. Even with Cornell’s fine financial aid program, early decision applicants run the risk of forfeiting a better financial aid offering from another school. This is why students for whom money is a significant object often wait to submit their applications until the regular decision deadline.

Reading between the lines, it may be possible to discern a distinctly financial consideration on the part of Cornell’s admissions office. Cornell’s decision to expand the class of 2013 means the University wants more students with more money to get the Big Red back on its feet. Given the circumstances, it is difficult to imagine Cornell would grow the incoming class by 100 poor students, each of whom would qualify for generous financial aid packages.

Perhaps Cornell is just playing the averages. It may be possible to argue that any group of 100 students will generate some profit for the University, even if a portion of that group is on financial aid. But Cornell’s increasing preference for early decision applicants makes that scenario seem less likely. By fielding an especially high proportion of the freshman class from a relatively wealthy group of students, the University has signaled that family income does matter when it comes to admissions.

This is a disturbing trend. For a university that advertises itself as “elite, not elitist,” admissions policies that favor wealthier students create the impression of hypocrisy. And the situation will only get worse. Allow me to illustrate with a hypothetical conversation (based loosely on a Simpsons episode in which Mr. Burns tries to get his son into Yale):

Mr. Jones: So, what are my son’s chances of getting into Cornell this year?

Guy from Cornell: How has he done in school?

Mr. Jones: He’s carrying a solid 2.2, with an upward trend in his senior year.

Guy from Cornell: How about his SAT scores?

Mr. Jones: He cracked 1,000 on his third try.

Guy from Cornell: Well, Mr. Jones, in many borderline cases, we require the donation of a new dormitory or a new football stadium. But in your son’s case, I think we’re going to have to ask for the new Cornell International Airport.

Mr. Jones: I’ll see what I can do.

Cornell is by no means the only school tweaking its admissions process to weather the economic storm. In a March 30 news story, “Paying in Full as the Ticket Into Colleges,” The New York Times listed a slew of private colleges and universities, including Bowdoin and Brandeis, that have taken advantage of exceptions to need-blind admissions standards by admitting more international students and more students off the waitlist. International applicants and waitlisted students at these schools and elsewhere are considered with need in mind.

Such strategies may work at Bowdoin and Brandeis, but they are misplaced at Cornell. A rolled-back need-blind admissions policy, either de facto or de jure, would be a major step backward for a school that has worked so hard to craft a socio-economically representative student body. The more students we accept based on wealth, the less students we’ll be able to accept based on merit. This is not the kind of school Uncle Ezra had in mind.