Over the eight years Obama was president of the United States, he believed and reaffirmed that schools should be a more diverse melting pot. President Obama implemented policies and showed schools how to create more diverse campuses. With an increasingly conservative supreme court and congress, Obama had to find a way to circumnavigate the law. The Obama administration released documents in 2011 that were essentially a guideline for schools to promote diversity with a race-minded admissions process. The guideline laid out legal ways for elementary schools, high schools, and colleges to use race as a deciding factor. For the past 7 years this has been great at generating more diverse student bodies.
Then, Donald J. Trump took over the Presidency and he has a slightly different view on affirmative action. Congruent with many conservatives’ ideals, Trump believes schools should admit students race-blind. This essentially means race is a non-factor involved in their acceptance. This mindset assumes merit is the primary factor that should be considered. Trump has since rescinded Obama’s guidance claiming it “particularly problematic and full of ‘hypotheticals’ intended to allow schools to skirt the law” (Green).
The Trump administration has decided to revert to the strategies of the George W. Bush administration when it comes to affirmative action. A document from the Bush administration was reposted in July on the Department of Education website, emphasizing a race-neutral approach to accepting applicants. I find it interesting that the Trump administration reposted it because the document was previously replaced with a notice that the policy was withdrawn for years.
Numerous lawsuits have made their way to the supreme court in claims of a white man or woman being denied admittance to a top tier university based on their race. In almost all of these cases, the court has ruled in favor of the school as it is the school’s right to decide based on race who is accepted to cultivate a diverse learning environment. Although Betsy DeVos has been hesitant to speak out on the topic of affirmative action policies in schools. The Department of Education was not involved in the litigation surrounding a recent Harvard case. DeVos has said “I think this has been a question before the courts and the courts have opined” (Green). While DeVos may be taking a more laissez-faire attitude towards affirmative action, there are hardliners who work under her in the department. Most prominently is Kenneth L. Marcus, the head of civil rights. Marcus founded an organization called Louis D. Brandeis Center which is a non-profit corporation aimed at advancing the civil and human rights of Jewish people. The group has outwardly spoken against affirmative action, claiming that schools have used quotas to exclude jewish students. The organization has also argued that colleges routinely discriminate against Asian-Americans. In the case of Fisher vs University of Texas Austin, the group filed a brief stating, “race conscious admission standards are unfair to individuals, and unhealthy for society at large”(Green). Affirmative action is the balance between generating diversity without racially profiling.
After Justice Anthony Kennedy’s retirement announcement last summer, this was a monumental opportunity for President Trump to appoint a new justice. As Trump had appointed Neil Gorsuch to replace Justice Scalia in October of 2017. Adding a new justice would give more sway to conservatives, and as we all know Brett Kavanaugh was appointed with a 50-48 vote from the senate. Say what you want about Kavanaugh, but right now we are accepting it as our reality. An anti affirmative action group has been suing Harvard university on the basis of discrimination against Asian Americans (Harvard University). Students for Fair Admissions, SFFA, claims that the university gives an unfair advantage to black, white, and hispanic students over Asian Americans. The university denies these allegations and claims the student population of Asian Americans on campus has increased by 29% over the past decade. They also currently make up roughly 22% of the population, only second to whites at less than 50%. The SFFA claims are slightly confusing as they are saying Asian Americans have a much lower chance of getting into Harvard yet they make up nearly a quarter of the population. The case is currently involved in a long trial with many hearings and has not been concluded upon, however it is predicted that this ruling will set a precedent for future affirmative action cases.
Sources:
BBC News. “Affirmative action: Trump ‘to scrap’ college racial bias policy.” BBC News, 3 July 2018, www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-44703874.
BBC News. “Harvard University ‘discriminates against Asian-Americans’.” BBC News, 16 June 2018, www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-44505355.
Caldera, Camille G., and Sahar M. Mohammadzadeh. “Harvard Admissions Trial Ruling Will Determine Facts for Future Appeals, Experts Say.” The Harvard Crimson, 20 Feb. 2019, www.thecrimson.com/article/2019/2/20/sffa-harvard-admissions-final-arguments/.
Green, Erica L., et al. “Trump Officials Reverse Obama’s Policy on Affirmative Action in Schools Video.” The New York Times, 3 July 2018, www.nytimes.com/2018/07/03/us/politics/ trump-affirmative-action-race-schools.html.
Images:
I can see both the benefits and drawbacks to affirmative action. It’s important to make sure that universities and colleges are as diverse as they can be, but I agree there might be a more effective way to create diversity than Affirmative Action. That being said, I don’t think a “race blind” approach would work because there’s still ways to discriminate without being necessarily aware that one is doing so. I’d be interested to see statistics on if college campuses have truly become more diverse since its implementation, versus statistics on “race blind” admissions.