WHAT IS AFFIRMATIVE ACTION?
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Affirmative action refers to policies or programs that aim to address historical and ongoing discrimination and promote equal opportunities for individuals from disadvantaged groups, particularly in areas such as employment, education, and business. It involves taking proactive steps to ensure that individuals from underrepresented or marginalized groups have access to the same opportunities as those from more privileged backgrounds.
The concept of affirmative action originated in the United States in the 1960s as a response to systemic racial discrimination. It was initially introduced to increase the representation of African Americans and other minority groups in educational institutions and workplaces. Affirmative action policies may involve various measures, such as preferential hiring, targeted recruitment efforts, scholarships or grants for underrepresented groups, and the establishment of diversity quotas or goals.
The specific implementation and scope of affirmative action can vary between countries, jurisdictions, and organizations. While some view affirmative action as a necessary tool to address historical injustices and promote diversity, others criticize it for potentially leading to reverse discrimination or unfairly treating individuals based on their race, gender, or other protected characteristics. The topic of affirmative action is often a subject of debate and has generated legal challenges in various countries.
RECENT SUPREME COURT RULING AND WHY THIS IS A BIG DEAL?
The U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday struck down race-conscious policies in college admissions, ending decades of precedent that had allowed schools nationwide to use such programs to increase the diversity of their student bodies.
Here is an explanation of the policies commonly known as affirmative action, their history, and the possible consequences of the court's decision.
WHAT IS AFFIRMATIVE ACTION?
In the context of higher education, affirmative action typically refers to admissions policies aimed at increasing the number of Black, Hispanic and other minority students on campus.
Colleges and universities that take race into consideration have said they do so as part of a holistic approach that reviews every aspect of an application, including grades, test scores and extracurricular activities.
The goal of race-conscious admissions policies is to increase student diversity in order to enhance the educational experience for all students. Schools also employ recruitment programs and scholarship opportunities intended to boost diversity, but the Supreme Court litigation was focused on admissions.
WHICH SCHOOLS CONSIDER RACE?
While many schools do not disclose details about their admissions processes, taking race into account is more common among selective schools that turn down most of their applicants.
In a 2019 survey by the National Association for College Admission Counseling, about a quarter of schools said race had a "considerable" or "moderate" influence on admissions, while more than half reported that race played no role whatsoever.
Nine states have banned the use of race in admissions policies at public colleges and universities: Arizona, California, Florida, Idaho, Michigan, Nebraska, New Hampshire, Oklahoma and Washington.
WHAT IS THE CURRENT LITIGATION ABOUT?
The Supreme Court decided two cases brought by Students for Fair Admissions, a group headed by Edward Blum, a conservative legal strategist who has spent years fighting affirmative action.
One case contended that Harvard's admissions policy unlawfully discriminates against Asian American applicants. The other asserted that the University of North Carolina unlawfully discriminates against white and Asian American applicants.
The schools rejected those claims, saying race is determinative in only a small number of cases and that barring the practice would result in a significant drop in the number of minority students on campus.
HOW HAS THE SUPREME COURT RULED IN THE PAST?
Before Thursday, the court had largely upheld race-conscious admissions for decades, though not without limits.
A divided Supreme Court took up the issue in the landmark 1978 case, Regents of the University of California v. Bakke, after schools began using affirmative action in response to the Civil Rights era to correct the effects of racial segregation.
The swing vote, Justice Lewis Powell, ruled that schools could not use affirmative action to rectify past racial discrimination and struck down the university's practice of setting aside a certain number of spots for minorities.
Nevertheless, Powell found that increasing campus diversity was a "compelling interest" because students of all races - not just minorities - would receive a better education if exposed to different viewpoints. Powell ruled that schools could weigh race in admissions as long as it remained only one factor among many.
In 2003, the court struck down the University of Michigan's use of a system that awarded "points" to minority applicants as going too far, but affirmed Bakke's central finding that schools could use race as one of several admission factors.
The court in 2016 again upheld race-conscious admissions in a challenge backed by Blum to University of Texas policies. But the court has moved sharply to the right since then, with six conservative justices now and only three liberals.
WHAT WILL COLLEGES DO IN RESPONSE?
The decision on Thursday will force elite colleges and universities to revamp their policies and search for new ways to ensure diversity in their student populations. Many schools have said other measures would not be as effective, resulting in fewer minority students on campuses.
In briefs filed with the Supreme Court, the University of California and the University of Michigan - top public college systems from states that have outlawed race-conscious admissions - said they have spent hundreds of millions of dollars on alternative programs intended to improve diversity, but that those efforts have fallen far short of goals.
HOW WILL NC SCHOOLS BE AFFECTED BY THIS DECISION?
The most immediate change to admissions processes could be seen in how, or if, prospective university students are asked to identify their race on admissions applications moving forward.
Though the ruling did not explicitly call for the end of students being asked to self-disclose their race on an application — either by checking a box or indicating it in other ways — “it seems clear that race cannot be used as a blanket category,” Klasik said.
Ted Shaw, a professor at the UNC School of Law who specializes in civil rights and affirmative action, told The N&O on Thursday he thought the ruling would cause colleges to reexamine how their applications ask about an applicant’s race.
Students for Fair Admissions, the anti-affirmative action group that brought the case against UNC to the Supreme Court, said in a statement the court’s decision compelled “the removal of all racial and ethnic classification boxes from undergraduate and postgraduate application forms,” adding that the group would “remain vigilant and intend to initiate litigation” if universities did not follow the ruling.
Klasik said universities may still include such questions and boxes on their applications to collect data about students who apply or subsequently enroll, though he is “almost certain” that data will be hidden from admissions officers.
The Common Application, a membership-based platform used by more than 1,000 colleges nationwide, said in a statement Thursday member schools will soon be able to hide from admissions officers any race or ethnicity information students choose to disclose.
Adrienne Amador Oddi, vice president of strategic enrollment and communications at Queens University of Charlotte, told The Charlotte Observer her chest tightened while reading the decision. It was a feeling all too familiar, Oddi said.
Even as the court appeared to end the use of race as a factor or category for admissions officers to consider, Chief Justice John Roberts’ majority opinion could leave open a door for students to discuss their race in application essays and have colleges consider it in some way, as long as it is tied to personal experiences or their character qualities.
During oral arguments in October, and again in her dissenting opinion, Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson noted considering a student’s experiences without regard to race could create unequal opportunities for students of color. For example, a white student, Jackson suggested, might be able to discuss their family’s history of attending UNC for generations — an experience that is not equally available to students of color, given the university’s history of segregation.
Klasik noted that the narrow, and somewhat unclear, confines in which students might be able to pen “a successful portrayal” of their experiences as tied to race could create additional barriers in the admissions process. Some students, he said, may be able to be coached or tutored through that process, but that will most likely not be the case for all students.
Race-neutral alternatives
Aside from deciding how, or if, to use racial indicators on students’ applications, colleges may consider alternative factors to race — often called “race-neutral alternatives” — to continue to yield some level of diversity on their campuses.
Socioeconomic status and where a student lives are generally the two most common race-neutral alternatives cited by opponents of race-conscious admissions.
In considering applicants’ socioeconomic status, “the idea would be that, rather than giving a boost to race, you would give it to students from lower socioeconomic backgrounds,” Klasik said, noting that “traditionally underrepresented racial minority students tend to come from lower socioeconomic backgrounds.”
Top 10 percent law
In considering or emphasizing where students live, colleges often develop plans to give equal opportunity by granting assured admission to top students at every high school in a state.
In Texas, for example, a “Top 10 Percent Law” guarantees admission to the state’s public universities for in-state students who graduate in the top 10% of their high school academically. At the University of Texas at Austin, which was involved in its own Supreme Court case over race-based affirmative action a few years ago, the university said the top 10% plan has “had a positive impact on increasing geographic diversity and providing more accessibility to UT Austin to students from all schools around the state.”
Colleges could also pursue more strategic and comprehensive approaches to diversity on their campuses, including by offering targeted outreach to underrepresented minority groups, bolstering community college transfer programs, increasing financial aid or eliminating legacy admissions preferences for children of alumni.
About two weeks prior to the ruling, Duke University announced it would begin offering free tuition this fall to students of families from North Carolina and South Carolina who make $150,000 or less, though the university has not explicitly tied that announcement to a then-potential decision by the Supreme Court.
Even with alternative factors or comprehensive strategies, selective colleges may experience declines in the racial diversity of their students.
Both the University of California system and the University of Michigan submitted briefs to the Supreme Court in support of UNC, saying the universities had experienced decreases in racial diversity after race-conscious affirmative action was banned in their respective states, despite race-neutral alternatives they implemented.
Prior to the Supreme Court ruling, a federal judge ruled there was “no non-racial approach that would promote such benefits about as well as” UNC’s race-conscious approach.
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