{"id":8926,"date":"2023-07-13T16:35:51","date_gmt":"2023-07-13T16:35:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/?p=8926"},"modified":"2023-07-13T17:11:21","modified_gmt":"2023-07-13T17:11:21","slug":"striving-for-diversity-without-affirmative-action","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/2023\/07\/13\/striving-for-diversity-without-affirmative-action\/","title":{"rendered":"Striving for Diversity Without Affirmative Action"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"
Janai Nelson<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

By Joshua Heron
\n<\/strong>Howard University News Service<\/strong><\/p>\n

Education officials, civil rights leaders, employers and students are debating the implications<\/a> of the U.S. Supreme Court\u2019s stance on affirmative action, which is forcing colleges and universities to brainstorm and implement new policies that ensure racial diversity on campus is consistent.<\/p>\n

Janai Nelson, president and director of the Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, reminded students and admissions officers that the Black story still matters and that diversity on college campuses is not an afterthought.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhile we are all disheartened and dismayed by this decision, we are also clear about the mandate we\u2019ll have before us,\u201d Nelson said. \u201cAnd that is not to abandon the project of diversity, but to double down on it because that is what our democracy requires.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe court said nothing in today’s opinion about a student or applicant not using their race as part of their admission submissions to explain their lived experience and to talk about how it has impacted their lives,\u201d Nelson said during a press conference held by the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, following the courts\u2019 decision on Thursday.<\/p>\n

In a 6-3 vote, the Supreme Court deemed race-based affirmative action unlawful, prohibiting colleges and universities from considering race as a factor in the admissions process.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Howard President Wayne A. I Frederick, PhD<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In October, the Supreme Court heard<\/a> oral arguments in Students for Fair Admissions v. University of North Carolina and Students for Fair Admissions v. President and Fellows of Harvard College. In 2014, conservative activist Edward Blum sued Harvard University and the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill over their use of race-conscious admissions.<\/p>\n

Armando Gimenez believes race played a factor in his acceptance to Columbia University based on the demographics of the Ivy League school in New York City.<\/p>\n

\u201cI would like to believe that I would have still been admitted into Columbia if they did not consider my race, but I cannot deny the facts,\u201d Gimenez, a first-year student, said.<\/p>\n

\u201cLooking at the demographics and my fellow peers I believe race played a large role in my admittance, and I may have not been admitted if not for the consideration.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Supreme Court\u2019s ruling affects not only predominantly white institutions like Columbia, but also HBCUs.<\/p>\n

Howard University President Wayne A.I. Frederick fears the ruling will create an immense burden on HBCUs in terms of enrollment — one too cumbersome to carry. He revealed those fears on CNN following the breaking news.<\/p>\n

\u201cHistorically Black colleges and universities are carrying an outsized burden to diversify so many industries in America. We represent only three percent of the higher [education] institutions, but we are responsible for 25 percent of the bachelor\u2019s degrees,\u201d Frederick said.<\/p>\n

\u201cBy not allowing race to be considered in admissions elsewhere, you can put an even more outsized burden on historically Black colleges and universities who don\u2019t have the capacity to carry that type of a burden.\u201d<\/p>\n

According to a Best Colleges study, \u201can overwhelming majority of college students believe racial\/ethnic diversity improves the social experience (62 percent) and learning environment (59 percent) of schools.\u201d<\/p>\n

However, the study also reveals that one-third of Black students are actually against affirmative action. More students from racial and ethnic groups than white students \u201creport negative impacts of race-conscious college admissions.\u201d<\/p>\n

Though its intent may be to create opportunities, its impact, according to some Black students, has not been the best. Jerry Charleston, a recent graduate of the University of North Carolina, agrees to an extent, but believes affirmative action hasn\u2019t been around long enough to access its impact.<\/p>\n

\u201cAlthough affirmative action has been extremely beneficial for the minority groups that it applies to, it has also had some issues in its productivity for these groups,\u201d Charleston said.<\/p>\n

Charleston does believe affirmative action\u2019s intent to provide equal opportunity will not be reached because of the court\u2019s decision.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe problem now, I believe, is that it is being repealed severely prematurely before its effects can really be seen universally among all groups of people.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAn even bigger issue is that it is starting with two schools that are historically \u2018white legacy\u2019 schools,\u201d Charleston said. \u201cIt has only been around since the \u201960s which is on average two to three familial generations of people who would actually experience the effects. That isn\u2019t long enough to create a legacy within an institution or business. I don\u2019t believe it has actually been around long enough to produce lasting effects or changes to overwrite a longer history of inequalities in education and occupation.\u201d<\/p>\n

Chief Justice John Roberts condemned Harvard University and the University of North Carolina in the conservative majority opinion.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Harvard and UNC admissions programs cannot be reconciled with the guarantees of the Equal Protection Clause [14th amendment],\u201d Roberts said. \u201cBoth programs lack sufficiently focused and measurable objectives warranting the use of race, unavoidably employ race in a negative manner, involve racial stereotyping and lack meaningful endpoints. We have never permitted admissions programs to work in that way, and we will not do so today.\u201d<\/p>\n

The three justices who voted in favor of affirmative action included Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, Sonia Sotomayor, and Elena Kagan. Jackson and Sotomayor wrote fierce dissent opinions in response to the conservative majority.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe best that can be said of the majority\u2019s perspective is that it proceeds (ostrich-like) from the hope that preventing consideration of race will end racism,\u201d Jackson said. \u201cBut if that is its motivation, the majority proceeds in vain. If the colleges of this country are required to ignore a thing that matters, it will not just go away. It will take longer for racism to leave us. And, ultimately, ignoring race just makes it matter more.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sotomayor added, \u201ctoday, this Court stands in the way and rolls back decades of precedent and momentous progress.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sotomayor defended her claims with statistics from University of California, Berkeley. California was the first state to ban affirmative action at public universities.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt the University of California, Berkeley, a top public university not just in California but also nationally, the percentage of Black students in the freshman class dropped from 6.32 percent in 1995 to 3.37 percent in 1998,\u201d Sotomayor said.<\/p>\n

The decline in diversity now seems inevitable, observers say.<\/p>\n

Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce <\/a>examined the success probability of six admission models. \u201cWhen it comes to the goal of equalizing college opportunity across advantaged and disadvantaged racial\/ethnic and socioeconomic groups, there is no good substitute for the consideration of race,\u201d the center reported.<\/p>\n

Following the court’s decision, Howard University released a statement warning of a ripple effect across the country.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe decision will not only have a devastating impact on the diversity of colleges and universities across the country, but will also decrease access to higher education for students of color everywhere,\u201d the university said. \u201cEducation is still a top driver of economic success for all Americans, and this decision will have far-reaching ramifications for those seeking equity in the college admissions process and beyond.\u201d<\/p>\n

Charleston said he would have applied to an HBCU if race-based affirmative action had been removed during his college application season.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf my race, ethnicity or specific background is viewed as a hindrance by reviewers when processing an application, then I would rather attend a school that would accept the potential benefits and drawbacks experienced from a certain upbringing and see that the accomplishments of what I or any other minority are capable of are worth investing in to see growth, such as an HBCU dedicated to that very thing,\u201d the recent UNC graduate said.<\/p>\n

Gimenez said his decision to apply to an Ivy League school would have remained the same if race was not a factor on his application; however, his pool of HBCU schools would have expanded.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf affirmative action was illegal, it would not have stopped my pursuits for an Ivy League college and Columbia. I would have applied to more HBCUs and put more consideration into my environment and peers.\u201d<\/p>\n

Proponents of affirmative action say the burden falls back on the Black race — the Black race that shouldn\u2019t be considered when education is at stake. However, they point out, race had a role in what water fountain one drank from, how long one went to jail because of crack-cocaine disparities and whether a hoodie deems one worthy of death.<\/p>\n

So much, they say, for \u201cpost-racial\u201d America.<\/p>\n

Joshua Heron is a recent graduate of Howard University and reporter for HUNewsServie.com. He will be pursuing a master\u2019s degree at Arizona State University in the fall.<\/em><\/p>\n

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By Joshua Heron Howard University News Service Education officials, civil rights leaders, employers and students are debating the implications of the U.S. Supreme Court\u2019s stance on affirmative action, which is forcing colleges and universities to brainstorm and implement new policies that ensure racial diversity on campus is consistent. Janai Nelson, president and director of the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[],"wf_post_folders":[183],"class_list":["post-8926","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-headline"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8926","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8926"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8926\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8957,"href":"http:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8926\/revisions\/8957"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8926"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8926"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8926"},{"taxonomy":"wf_post_folders","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/wordpress.thetruthtoledo.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/wf_post_folders?post=8926"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}