Wealthy parents have found a new, totally legal trick to game the college admissions system — transferring guardianship of their teens to relatives or friends so the kids can cry poor on their financial-aid applications.

The shameful tactic — reported Monday in The Wall Street Journal, amid an ongoing probe of a separate nationwide admissions scandal — has apparently helped dozens of well-off Illinois families intercept scholarships and federal tuition aid intended for the poor.

Under the plan, deep-pocketed families go through the courts to legally transfer guardianship of their college-bound kids, at which point the teens can claim independent student status and have only their monetary resources documented by financial-aid bean-counters, the report said.

“Our financial-aid resources are limited and the practice of wealthy parents transferring the guardianship of their children to qualify for need-based financial aid — or so-called opportunity hoarding — takes away resources from middle- and low-income students,” Andrew Borst, director of undergraduate enrollment at the University of Illinois, told The Journal. “This is legal, but we question the ethics.”

Multiple parents who outlined the process to the paper under condition of anonymity indicated that they learned it at an Illinois consultant company, Destination College, which reportedly asked clients to sign confidentiality agreements covering the loophole.

The company’s owner did not respond to The Journal’s requests for comment.

A review of more than 1,000 probate court cases filed in Lake County, Ill., yielded 38 cases in 2018 alone in which guardianship of a high school junior or senior was transferred, the report said.

Several of the families live in homes valued at more than $1 million, and almost all of the applications feature versions of this argument: “The guardian can provide educational and financial support and opportunities to the minor that her parents could not otherwise provide.”

College admissions and government officials are probing the strategy, according to the report, but it seems to be technically legal.

“They are gaming the system,” countered Justin Draeger, head of the National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators, to The Journal. “Whether it is legal or not doesn’t make it any less unsavory.”

The latest trick came to light months after a bombshell federal investigation alleged that dozens of well-heeled families paid big bucks to a connected college-prep expert to secure their kids’ admissions using fudged test scores and doctored applications.

Those snared include TV actresses Lori Loughlin and Felicity Huffman.