Affirmative action has a long and complicated history that is difficult to address in an article of this size. However, it is worth briefly discussing the history and impact that affirmative action was intended to have versus the impact that it actually has. Back in the 1960s when affirmative action was first introduced by President John F. Kennedy, it was intended to eliminate discrimination against historically disadvantaged groups on the basis of race, creed, color, or national origin. Over the years, this policy would be amended to include other minority groups and eliminate discrimination in hiring practices and workplace behavior.
As time went on, these policies would find their way into the university system. Universities began to take race into consideration during the application processes in order to help increase the diversity of their institutions. However, this practice would go to what some people noted as extremes and become the subject of multiple court cases. Most notably in the 2003 Supreme Court case Grutter v. Bollinger, the Supreme Court upheld allowing universities to consider the race of applicants on an individual basis for admissions, but they could not have quotas of any kind. This is what led to new court cases, most notably against Harvard, on the basis of discriminating against Asian students.
Based on this information, a few things stand out to me. The intent of this law is good and practical in the workplace environment. This is a practice that should be continued from a workplace perspective because racial quotas rarely (if ever) exist in those environments since employers typically want to only hire the best possible candidate regardless of immutable characteristics. However, affirmative action appears completely different in the university system.
While I agree that diversity is important in any institution, there are many factors to take into account when admitting students to colleges, including their personal history in conjunction with SAT scores and academics. To say that someone deserves to enter any institution based on academic credentials alone is bad policy. How does a student like that fair outside of the classroom? Will they get involved on campus? Will they help to shape the world around them and ultimately the future of the world we all share, just through academics? Probably not. Someone who strictly displays one good quality does not make a qualified candidate.
At the same time, it is critical that students are up to the merit standards of the institution, and can handle the same level of work as their peers. Many universities have hurt historically disadvantaged students by lowering their admissions standards. When this happens, students are less capable of competing with their peers who were admitted on normal standards. There are multiple studies showcasing this exact situation. For example, in California when the state constitution was amended, the University of California System was barred from discriminating against students on the basis of race, sex, color, ethnicity, or national origin. While minority enrollment dropped at the more elite schools in the UC system, enrollment and academic success rates amongst disadvantaged students increased at other schools. Prior to this constitutional amendment, 15% of African-American and 17% of American-Indian students were in danger of failing, as compared with 4% of white students. This case and many others are well-detailed in an article from the Heritage Foundation titled “How Affirmative Action at Colleges Hurts Minority Students.”
In a similar fashion, legacy enrollment has the same negative effects. White students who are admitted on a legacy basis perform at lower levels as compared to their white peers who were not enrolled on a legacy basis. This policy is discriminatory to historically disadvantaged students, and harmful to those who are advantaged by it.
I am in support of programs that support historically disadvantaged students going to schools that they qualify for but cannot financially afford. For example, I think Stevens has done a good job instituting the Clark Scholars Program and the ACES program to help those students. It is also encouraging to hear that Stevens and many other institutions of higher learning have joined the American Talent Initiative, which aims to “substantially [expand] opportunity and access for low- and moderate-income students.”
I guess what I’m really trying to say here is that it is up to each student to perform as best as they can during their high school careers given their individual circumstances, and college administrators need to take those circumstances into account during the admissions process in order to create a more level playing field for everyone. This level playing field will help students to succeed in an environment that is more conducive to them and their goals. So affirmative action can be a good thing, but it needs to be reworked to do the job it was intended to do.
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