By Angelina Tang
In early November, two college affirmative action cases went to the Supreme Court against Harvard University and the University of North Carolina. These two cases are separate but similar, claiming that these universities are discriminating against Asian-American and white applicants in their admissions processes. The rulings of these cases could potentially overturn precedents and have widespread effects on the college admission process in the future. In order to understand this, however, one must start at the beginning – what is affirmative action, what is its history, and why does it matter?
Affirmative action, in general, refers to the practice of improving diversity in the workplace or higher education by consciously pushing for the employment and admittance of underrepresented minorities. College affirmative action more specifically refers to how higher education institutions favor those of certain ethnicities in their admissions. Those in favor of the system say that increased diversity on campus leads to a better learning environment and also helps underprivileged minorities take steps in improving their status in society. Those in opposition to the system critique the fact that by favoring certain races, they inherently discriminate against others who may be more well-qualified in every way but their ethnicity.
This is a problem that has been debated since the late 1900s, when affirmative action was first put in place by President JFK; it has gone to the Supreme Court many times in the past. The first ruling was in 1978, when the Supreme Court ruled affirmative action programs as constitutional in the University of California, Davis v. Bakke case. At the time, UC Davis reserved spots in its medical school for minority students; Allan Bakke (a white male) was rejected despite being more academically qualified than the admitted minority students, so he sued. The Court did rule that having reserved spots, or a quota, for minorities was unconstitutional, but it approved of the consideration of race in admissions. This set a precedent of colleges being permitted to favor certain minorities.
Next came two cases in 2003, both of which were against the University of Michigan. Gratz v. Bollinger and Grutter v. Bollinger involved three white students suing over being rejected. In the former, Jennifer Gratz and Patrick Hamacher sued over the points-based admissions system that Michigan used. Applicants who scored over 100 on a 150-point scale were accepted, and members of minority groups were granted twenty points based solely on their race. The court ruled this as unconstitutional due to the consideration of race not being on an individualized basis; instead of narrowing down the applicant pool by other means and then putting race into consideration, applicants could be granted admission essentially due to their minority status. In Grutter v. Bollinger, in which Barbara Grutter sued over her rejection from Michigan’s law school, the court ruled it as constitutional to consider race only if it is on an individually tailored basis. In other words, an algorithm cannot be used in admissions that automatically improves all minority applicants’ odds of acceptance. This “individualized” consideration of race is the precedent these cases set.
Fisher v. University of Texas in 2013 continued to uphold affirmative action, in which the court sided with the school; however, it was also recognized that race should only be a consideration if other race-blind alternatives for admissions actually diminish diversity on the campus.
In the modern era, the tide is beginning to shift against affirmative action. This change is actually expected; back in Grutter v. Bollinger, the Court actually stated that consciously pushing for diversity and investing resources in it is not expected to be sustainable after about 25 years. Now, the conservative group has sued both Harvard University and the University of North Carolina for, as their organization name implies, unfair admissions. In particular, it is noteworthy that the Harvard case is for the discrimination against both white and Asian American students – a new and more glaring point of contention against affirmative action. The university is favoring minorities to improve diversity, yes, but not all minorities.
In discussion, you could argue that because Asian culture generally favors education, the percentage of high-achieving, qualified Asian students would be disproportionately high if they were favored the way other minorities are. And that is true; for instance, Harvard’s class of 2026’s statistics showed that 27.9% of their students are Asian American, compared to 6% of the U.S. population. A 2013 study done by Harvard stated that if they based admissions on academic qualifications alone, their Asian student population back then would’ve risen from 18.7% to 43%. Considering the increase in Asian American citizens in the U.S. between then and now, the proportional increase from 18.7% to 27.9% is reasonable, and by extension, a more dramatic percentage of the student population (over 50%) would be Asian if today’s admissions became race-blind. The only reason it’s controlled is due to Harvard’s admissions system manually lowering it with their personal rating system consistently grading Asian American students lower. While this isn’t necessarily a result of affirmative action, it may still be debated in the case and may affect the results.
If the Supreme Court deems these cases unconstitutional, then the precedent of slowly phasing out of affirmative action may be set. What this will do for diversity in the most elite of schools is up for debate; generally, only very selective schools utilize affirmative action, and a major reason for that is simply due to economic status. Elite colleges – and the necessary K-12 education to qualify for them – are expensive, and a lower proportion of Black, Hispanic, and Latino citizens are included in the wealthy or upper middle class of the U.S.. As a result, less properly qualify compared to white and Asian American students; affirmative action simply seeks to remedy that. The Court’s ruling will definitely affect elite education, but the magnitude of its ruling today has yet to be seen. For now, we can only wait for a ruling to be released on these cases.
