The job application essay becomes a place to talk about race.

The college essay may become more important after the Supreme Court decision, and a place where students can emphasize their racial or ethnic background — but with a big warning sign from the court.

In deciding to abolish the affirmative action policies of Harvard and the University of North Carolina, Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. wrote: “Nothing prohibits universities from taking an applicant’s discussion of the impact of race on the applicant’s life into consideration, as long as that discussion is concretely linked to a character quality or unique ability that the particular applicant can contribute to the university.

However, the Chief Justice also shot across the bow at anyone who might think the essay could be used as a covert means of race selection.

“Despite claims to the contrary, universities should not be allowed to establish simply through the application essays or other means the regime we today consider illegitimate,” he wrote, underlining: “What cannot be done directly cannot be be done indirectly.”

Some education officials had already devised a strategy for using the essay. In a recent presentation sponsored by the American Council on Education, Shannon Gundy, the director of undergraduate admissions at the University of Maryland, said students should modify their admissions essays to describe how race had affected their lives.

“At the moment, students are writing about their football training; they write about their grandmother’s death,” she said. “They don’t write about their trials and tribulations. They don’t write about the challenges they’ve been through.”

Beginning in the fall, colleges will be able to use essay questions to collect information about a student’s background, even if they’re concerned about the ruling, Ms. Gundy said in an email.

“We will need to work together to develop actionable essay pointers, teach counselors and students how best to approach the college essay, and provide information to colleges that may be hesitant (or even risk-averse) about how to ask more. make sense,” she said.