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3/00 La Griffe du Lion: "Standardized Tests: The Interpretation of Racial and
Ethnic Gaps," http://www.lagriffedulion.f2s.com/testing.htm
6/24/03 Los Angeles Times:
"Court Affirms Use of Race in University
Admissions,"
The Supreme Court struck down the University of
Michigan's
undergraduate admissions policy because it gave 20 bonus points
to "underrepresented" minority applicants, which the university said
did
not include Asian Americans.
The University of Michigan Law School receives about
3,500
applications for 350 seats in its entering class. It chooses from students
who have outstanding grades and test scores. It also seeks a
"critical
mass" of "underrepresented minority" students who are black,
Latino or
Native American.
In recent years, 13% to 20% of its entering class has been
made up of
minorities. The proportion would have dropped to about 4% had the law
school been required to admit students strictly based on their grades and
test scores, O'Connor said.
Barbara Grutter, the white plaintiff, was rejected despite a
3.8 grade-
point average and a score of 161 on the Law School Admissions Test.
This was better than many of the minority applicants who were admitted,
O'Connor noted.
Someday, she said, the nation should revert to a strictly
"race-neutral
admissions formula" at all colleges. But that time has not arrived,
she
added.
Requiring
a "race-blind admissions policy" now would exclude most
of the black and Latino students at the nation's most selective schools,
she said.
Still, affirmative action should not continue forever, she
concluded.
"Enshrining
a permanent justification of racial preferences would
offend [the] fundamental equal protection principle" set by the
Constitution,
O'Connor said. "We expect that 25 years from now, the use of racial
preferences will no longer be necessary to further the interest approved
today."
In dissent, Rehnquist called the focus on attaining a
"critical mass" of
minority students "a naked effort to achieve racial balancing."
Justices
Thomas, Antonin Scalia and Anthony M. Kennedy agreed with him.
4/18/03 San Francisco
Chronicle: "Minority admissions bouncing back at UC"
UCLA admitted 10,507 of a record 44,931
freshman applicants from
inside and outside the state -- or 23.4%. UC Berkeley admitted 8,679 of a
record 36,920 freshman applicants inside and outside California -- 23.5%.
At UCLA, African American students dropped to 281 from 332 last
year.
UCLA's Latino admissions fell from 1,355 last year to 1,347, while Native
Americans decreased from 39 to 36. At UC Berkeley, African American
freshman admissions for this fall show the largest percentage drop among
all ethnic groups, decreasing 2.3% from last year -- from 305 to 298. African
American admissions were 562 in fall 1997, the last year before Prop 209
took effect.
Feb. 2003 The Journal of Blacks in Higher Education: "How
Bans on
Race-Sensitive Admissions Severely Cut Black Enrollments at
Flagship State Universities,"
California, Florida, Georgia, and Texas
prohibit their state
universities from considering race as a positive factor in the
admissions process.
In
2001 the University of Georgia began to use a race-neutral
admissions policy. This year 65% of all applicants to the University
of Georgia were accepted for admission. Only 46.5% of black
applicants were admitted.
Affirmative
action was prohibited in 2001 for admission to the
University of Florida at Gainesville. That year black first-year
enrollments dropped to 460 from 829 a year earlier when
race was still considered in the admissions process. Black first-year
enrollment dropped 45%.
In the 2002 entering class there are 659 black students, up
43%
from a year earlier. Blacks made up nearly 10% of the first-year class
at the University of Florida, up from 7.1% the year before. Blacks
were slightly more likely to be accepted than whites at the University
of Florida this year. More than 65% of all black applicants were
admitted compared to 58% of white applicants. Black enrollments at
the University of Florida remain 21% below the level of two years
ago when affirmative action was used.
In 1996 voters in California passed Proposition 209 which
banned
racial preferences in admissions in the state university system. The
ban took effect for graduate programs in 1997 and for undergraduate
students in 1998.
For applicants for the fall 1998 entering class, the number
of blacks
admitted to the University of California at Berkeley was down more
than 57% from a year earlier. Only 95 black freshmen enrolled in 1998,
down from 258 black first-year students the year before when
affirmative action was still permitted. This was a drop of more than 63%.
This
year there are 142 black first-year students at Berkeley, and
they make up 3.9% of the freshman class. The number of black students
at Berkeley is up 49% from the low of 95 black freshmen in 1998. The
number of black freshmen at Berkeley is down 45% from the level that
prevailed before the ban on affirmative action was instituted in 1998.
In March 1996 in the Hopwood case, the U.S. Court of Appeals
for
the Fifth Circuit ruled affirmative action at the University of Texas law
school violated the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment
of the U.S. Constitution. When the U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear
an appeal in the case, Texas' attorney general issued an opinion that
all state universities should abolish affirmative action admissions plans.
In 1996, 501 black students were admitted to the
undergraduate
program at the University of Texas at Austin. The next year, there were
419 black admits. In the fall of 1997, there were 163 black enrollees,
one more than had enrolled a year earlier. Because of a large increase
in white enrollments, the black percentage of the freshman class at the
Austin campus dropped from 2.9% in 1996 to 2.5% in 1997.
In the current 2002-03 academic year there are 271 black
first-year
students at the Austin campus. This is 67% more than was the case in
1996 before the Hopwood decision was announced. In 1996 blacks
made up 2.9% of all entering students. Today, blacks make up 3.4% of
the freshman class. The black student graduation rate at the University
of Texas at Austin is 51%.
The University of Texas law school did not graduate its first
black
student until 1954. By 1974, 22 blacks had graduated from the law
school. In the mid-1970s, an affirmative action admissions program
was set in place. By 1979 there were 17 blacks in the graduating class.
In 1986 there were 44 black graduates. From 1986 to 1996, there was
an average of 36 blacks in each first-year law class.
In 1996, immediately before the Hopwood ruling that year, 65
black
students were admitted to the University of Texas law school. The next
year, after the ban on affirmative action went into effect, only 11 black
students were admitted to the law school, a drop of 83%. There were 31
black students in the first-year law school class in 1996. In 1997 there
were four black first-year students, a drop of 87%. This year, the sixth
entering class since the Hopwood decision, there are 21 black first-year
students. Black enrollments are only one half the level that prevailed
in 1992.
As late as 1994, 31 black first-year students enrolled at the
Boalt
Hall law school at the University of California at Berkeley. The next year
the regents imposed the affirmative action ban, which went into effect
in 1997. In 1996, the last year of race-sensitive admissions at Boalt
Hall, 20 first-year black students enrolled, a drop of 35% from the
previous year.
In 1997 the regents' ban on affirmative action went into
effect for
graduate programs at the University of California. That year black law
school admits dropped from 77 to 18, a decrease of 76.6%. Black first-
year enrollments dropped from 20 in 1996 to one in 1997. In each of the
past two years 14 black first-year students have enrolled. Today first-year
enrollments are less than one half the level of black enrollments that
prevailed when Boalt Hall practiced affirmative action.
In 1994, black enrollments at the UCLA law school reached a
high of
46. The next year, after the affirmative action ban was announced, black
enrollments dropped by more than one half to 20. In 1997, when the ban
took effect, there were only 10 black first-year law students at UCLA.
In 1999 only three black first-year law school students enrolled at UCLA.
Since 1999 black enrollments have edged up each year. This past fall
13 black students enrolled, less than one third the total black first-year
enrollments that existed eight years ago in 1994 when affirmative action
was still practiced.
5/01 PERSPECTIVES, the Harvard Liberal Monthly, "Gov Jocks: Athletes
get more than they deserve,"
As a group of potential students,
athletes have the greatest admissions
advantage, with a gap that is increasing. In 1989, male athletes had a 30%
better chance of being admitted than non-athletes with the same SAT scores.
By 1999, that number had jumped to 48%. By contrast, during that year,
legacies had a 25% admissions advantage and minorities, 18%. Athletes
also have lower SAT scores than other admitted students. In 1989 for the Ivy
League, the average male student had an SAT score of 1337, with the
average low profile male athlete at 1298 and the average high profile male
athlete at 1212.
Female athletes hold a 53% admissions advantage over other
women,
whereas legacies have a 24% admissions advantage and minorities, 20%.
Women athletes are also academic underperformers. Most troublesome
about the statistics for women athletes, however, is that, like male athletes,
their academic performance is dropping. In 1976, the average female Ivy
League athlete ranked at the 51st percentile in her class; now she ranks in
the 46th percentile. 41% of female athletes sit in the bottom third of their
class, as compared to 27% of non-athlete women.
Although legacies receive preferential treatment for college
admissions as
well, their parents have a tendency to give money to their respective colleges,
so admitting legacies makes good financial sense. Not so for athletes. Even
large and successful programs, like the University of Michigan's, are
perennial money losers. College athletes are less likely to donate money to
their alma maters and are more likely to give money directly to the athletic
department and nothing else in the school (even though, remember, they
make more cash after graduation).
1/20/03 Princetonian: "Princeton may join Harvard in backing Michigan
admissions,"
According to "The Shape of the
River," a study conducted by former
Princeton president William Bowen and former Harvard president Derek
Bok, race-neutral admissions policies would reduce the overall chance of
admission for an African-American applicant from 42% to 13%. Similarly,
they estimate that the percentage of African-American matriculants in the
schools studied would drop from 7.1% to 2.1%. At the University of California
at Berkeley, which eliminated its affirmative action programs starting with
the class entering in the fall of 1998, the proportion of African-American
students in the freshman class fell from 6.8% in 1997 to 2.4% the next year.
12/18/02 Wall Street Journal: "Law Schools
Hatch Rebellion Against
U.S. News Rankings: Group of Law Schools Weighs Plan To Deny
LSAT Scores to Magazine,"
For years, college and university
administrators have griped about the
influential U.S. News & World Report rankings of their institutions. Among
their complaints: The magazine's standings stoke the competitive frenzy over
college admissions and inflate the importance of applicants' test scores.
Under a concept being developed by the Law School Admission
Council, a nonprofit organization of 185 U.S. law schools and 15 in Canada
that administers the Law School Admission Test, member schools would no
longer be told the actual LSAT scores of their applicants -- and so couldn't
provide schoolwide scores to the magazine.
Under the proposed change, when a law school asks the council
for an
applicant's LSAT score, the council would disclose only how that student's
score ranks among all the school's applicants. For example, it might say
that the student's score was in the 63rd percentile of applicants, or in
the 55th percentile of students whom the school admitted the previous
year. But the council wouldn't divulge the applicant's individual score.
The change "would take some pressure off the use of this
test in
the admissions process, which we believe is desirable," says
admission council President Philip Shelton. As a result, he contends,
LSAT scores would fade in importance for admissions compared
with other credentials, such as grades and leadership ability.
Nearly every law school requires applicants to take the LSAT,
which measures reading comprehension as well as reasoning ability
and is scored on a 120-180 scale.
In
2001-2002, the council administered 134,251 LSAT tests to more
than 100,000 students; about 20% of students take it twice. Once a
school receives an application, it
contacts the council for the applicant's
score.
A year ago, the council appointed a group headed by Richard
Geiger, dean of admissions at Cornell University's law school, to
brainstorm ways of reducing the reliance on the LSATs. Mr. Geiger
describes the plan that resulted, which includes the new way of
handling LSAT scores, as "a solution that seems to have wheels."
Mr. Shelton says the plan is still "embryonic," and
would require
approval from the council's 18-member board. Among unresolved
questions are whether the applicant would be told his or her
numerical score, and whether participation in the plan would be
compulsory for all law schools. At the very least, he says, "some
solid number" of the nation's top 25 law schools would have to buy
into the idea for it to succeed. If all goes well, he says, the council,
based in Newtown, Pa., would test the plan on a sample of students
entering law school in 2004, and then implement it for 2005.
Since
whites significantly outscore minorities on the LSAT,
Mr. Shelton adds, law schools that de-emphasize the test would
also have the "flexibility" to admit more minorities -- pending the
outcome of a case before the U.S. Supreme Court on the
legality of race preferences at the University of Michigan law
school.
12/8/02 New York Times: "Using Synonyms
for Race, College Strives for
Diversity,"
When a federal appeals court in
New Orleans ruled in 1996 that the
University of Texas Law School could not legally consider race in admitting
students, lawyers at Rice University, a highly selective private college here,
reluctantly decided that the ruling applied to it, too. Almost overnight, the
admissions officers at Rice stopped saying aloud the words "black,"
"African-American," "Latino," "Hispanic" or even
"minority" in their
deliberations.
The next year, the proportion of black students admitted in
the freshman
class fell by half; the proportion of Hispanics fell by nearly a third. The
university feared that openly defying the federal court could cost it $45
million annually in federal aid, about 15% of its budget.
But like other colleges, Rice says it remains fiercely
committed to having
a diverse student body, so in the years since, it has developed creative,
even sly ways to meet that goal and still obey the court. Thus the admissions
committee, with an undisguised wink, has encouraged applicants to discuss
"cultural traditions" in their essays, asked if they spoke English as
a second
language and taken note, albeit silently, of those identified as presidents of
their black student associations.
Those efforts, along with stepped-up recruiting at high
schools with
traditionally high minority populations, yielded a freshman class last year
with a near-record composition of blacks and Hispanics. Of the 700
freshmen, 7% are black, 11% Hispanic.
The experience of Rice provides a preview of the subtle ways
that life
would most likely change inside the admissions offices of colleges like
Yale, Princeton and Stanford should the Supreme Court decide to impose
strict restrictions on affirmative action. Those restrictions could be issued
next year, when, the court said this week, it intends to consider two cases
challenging racial preferences in admissions at the University of Michigan.
At issue is the court's 1978 Bakke decision, which has been widely
interpreted as permitting public and private colleges to consider an
applicant's race a "plus" in assembling a class.
Public
universities - including those in Texas, Florida and California -
have responded to lower-court decisions and other efforts to roll back
Bakke by automatically accepting a set percentage of students ranked at
the top of each public high school in their states. Because some of those
high schools have heavy minority populations, a minority presence in the
university system is assured.
But private colleges like Rice have long shunned such
formulas as too
mechanical and impersonal and have instead adopted a more nuanced
approach that colleges elsewhere see as a blueprint, should they face a
prohibition like that imposed by the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, whose
jurisdiction is Texas, Mississippi and Louisiana.
"You can no
longer say to the committee, `This is a great African-
American from New York,' " said Julie M. Browning, the dean for
undergraduate enrollment at Rice. "You have to drop a lot of language
associated with affirmative action." Instead, Ms. Browning said, the
admissions team at Rice has developed a whole new vocabulary -
including the overarching goal of achieving "cultural inclusiveness"
in the
student body - to justify its admissions decisions.
That new lexicon
was evident this morning as the seven-member
admissions committee met under a vaulted stucco ceiling here to winnow
the list of nearly 500 students who have applied for early admission to the
Class of 2007.
One of the first candidates under consideration had an
obviously
Hispanic last name, but no one on the committee mentioned it. Though
other colleges affix color-coded stickers to the folders of minority
applicants, Rice blots out students' answers to questions on their
application about race or ethnicity. (Office assistants who are sworn to
secrecy first record the answers for later use to make a statistical profile
of applicants.) While there were obvious clues that this applicant was
Hispanic - a recommendation from a teacher noted his "desire to
represent his Hispanic heritage" - the members of the committee found
other ways to support his case, including his good grades in hard
courses. "He is first-generation college," said Jamila Mensa, the
admissions officer charged with making the presentation. "The teacher
described him as altruistic."
Another committee
member, noting problems in the student's family,
used admissions' shorthand to describe the candidate as "an overcome,"
and later said, "I just like the `overcome' here." In the committee's
opinion, these qualities helped the student rise above an SAT score
more than 150 points below the 1400-point median at Rice in recent
years. After just a few minutes of discussion, he was unanimously
admitted.
For opponents of affirmative action, who have long argued
that
colleges have different standards for white and nonwhite applicants, the
vote on this student would have provided little comfort. In response to
a reporter's question, university officials refused to release statistics
that they have gathered comparing the SAT scores of minority
applicants accepted to Rice to those of non-minority applicants. They
said only that the scores of minorities are generally lower nationally,
and in the Rice pool as well.
Partly by
engaging in delicate minuets like those danced by the
committee this morning, Rice has faced no legal challenges in the six
years since the lower court ruled in the case known as Hopwood v.
Texas.
"You can't be using race or ethnicity as a factor in
admission," said
Richard Zansitis, the university's general counsel, in explaining the
ground rules of Hopwood, which could serve the Supreme Court as a
blueprint. "On the other hand, if a student has shown leadership - it may
be in the black students association, it could be the chess club - that's
something to look for in assessing that student as an individual.
Whether it's leadership in an ethnic or racial organization is irrelevant."
The timing of the Hopwood decision was especially inopportune
for
Rice, which generally receives about 7,000 applications for a freshman
class of about 700. Founded by a wealthy cotton trader in the early
1900's as an exclusively white institution, the university went to court in
1965 to change its charter so that minority students would be welcome
to study on its campus of gingerbread buildings. By 1996, the
proportion of blacks (7.7%) and Hispanics (11%) in the freshman class
was among the highest of any top college in the nation. Six years later,
the Class of 2006, which arrived on campus this fall, was 7.1% black
and 11% Hispanic. The percentage of Asian-Americans was 16%.
11/20/02 Associated Press: "Rights
panel: Diversity lags under UC plan.
Admissions policy adopted to replace race-based system is called
ineffective. UC disputes that."
The U.S. Commission on Civil Rights
reported fewer blacks and
Hispanics were admitted and enrolled in the University of California
graduate law and medical programs in 2001 than in 1995. The state
voted to end race-based admissions in 1996, although the ban did not
take effect until 1998-99. Fewer blacks enrolled as undergraduates in
2001 than in 1995, as well. The number of Hispanics who enrolled grew
slightly in that period. But they made up a smaller portion of the student
body.
The University of California
said last month that minority enrollment
at the medical and law schools is lower than it was before the passage
of Proposition 209.
In Texas, the report showed
fewer blacks and Hispanics were
admitted and enrolled at the University of Texas at Austin in 2001 than
in 1996, before a federal court outlawed affirmative action in
admissions at public universities.
10/22/02 The Journal of Blacks in Higher Education: "The Progress of
Black Student Enrollments at the Nation's Highest-Ranked Colleges
and Universities,"
Admission of African-Americans at the Highest
Ranked Universities, Fall 2002
(As rated by U.S. News and World Report. Universities are listed by highest
percentage of black students).
|
Institution |
All applicants |
Total accepted |
Overall acceptance rate |
Black applicants |
Blacks Accepted |
Black acceptance rate |
Difference in acceptance rates |
|
U. of North Carolina Chapel Hill |
17,484 |
6,080 |
27.9% |
2,076 |
812 |
39.1% |
11.2, 40.1% more than overall rate |
|
Stanford |
18,599 |
2,368 |
12.7 |
** |
295 |
** |
? |
|
Duke |
15,894 |
3,753 |
23.6 |
1,542 |
** |
** |
? |
|
U. of Virginia |
14,657 |
5,586 |
38.1 |
1,031 |
634 |
61.5 |
23.4, 61.4%+ |
|
U. of Michigan |
25,108 |
12,315 |
49.0 |
1,795 |
1,038 |
57.8 |
8.8, 18%+ |
|
Yale |
15,466 |
2,009 |
13.0 |
951 |
** |
** |
? |
|
Princeton |
14,521 |
1,575 |
10.8 |
** |
193 |
** |
? |
|
Emory |
9,789 |
4,142 |
42.3 |
1,226 |
481 |
39.2 |
-3.1, 7.3% less than overall rate |
|
Brown |
14,612 |
2,465 |
16.9 |
912 |
191 |
20.9 |
4.0, 23.7%+ |
|
Rice |
7,080 |
1,684 |
23.8 |
408 |
124 |
30.4 |
6.6, 27.7%+ |
|
Columbia |
16,162 |
2,268 |
14.0 |
1,058 |
** |
** |
? |
|
Georgetown |
15,537 |
3,288 |
21.2 |
1156 |
320 |
27.7 |
6.5, 30.7%+ |
|
Harvard |
19,609 |
2,066 |
10.5 |
** |
183 |
** |
? |
|
Washington |
19,514 |
4,594 |
23.5 |
1,658 |
316 |
19.1 |
-4.4, 18.7% less than overall rate |
|
Dartmouth |
10,194 |
2,092 |
20.5 |
407 |
174 |
42.8 |
22.3, 108.8%+ |
|
MIT |
10,664 |
1,724 |
16.2 |
443 |
126 |
28.4 |
12.2, 75.3%+ |
|
Vanderbilt |
9,836 |
4,550 |
46.3 |
485 |
255 |
52.6 |
6.3, 13.6%+ |
|
Carnegie Mellon |
14,271 |
5,440 |
38.1 |
762 |
358 |
47.0 |
8.9, 23.4%+ |
|
U. of Pennsylvania |
18,784 |
3,951 |
21.0 |
1,220 |
353 |
28.9 |
7.9, 37.6%+ |
|
Johns Hopkins |
8,915 |
3,128 |
35.1 |
494 |
236 |
47.8 |
12.7, 36.2%+ |
|
Northwestern |
14,294 |
4,718 |
33.0 |
751 |
** |
** |
?? |
|
Cornell |
21,502 |
6,133 |
28.5 |
877 |
314 |
35.8 |
7.3, 25.6%+ |
|
U. of Chicago |
8,162 |
3,393 |
41.6 |
** |
** |
** |
? |
|
U. of California at Berkeley |
36,472 |
8,713 |
23.9 |
1,558 |
331 |
21.2 |
-2.7, 11.3% less than overall rate |
|
UCLA |
36,842 |
10,294 |
28.0 |
1,661 |
347 |
21.0 |
-7.0, 25% less than overall rate |
|
U. of Notre Dame |
9,745 |
3,336 |
34.2 |
256 |
131 |
51.2 |
17, 49.7%+ |
|
California Institute of Technology |
2,612 |
560 |
21.4 |
44 |
13 |
29.5 |
8.1, 37.8%+ |
|
Average |
|
|
|
|
|
|
7.7, 28.8% more than overall rate |
** declined to provide info
10/02 The Journal of Blacks in Higher Education:
"The Expanding Racial
Scoring Gap Between Black and White SAT Test Takers"
Under
an admissions system in which race can no longer be used as a positive factor in
the admissions process, standardized test scores will
almost certainly become a more important component in deciding who is admitted
and who is rejected at our leading colleges and universities.
The latest statistics on standardized test scores for college
admissions
show clearly that if the race-neutral admissions policies now in place in
California, Texas, Florida, Georgia, and Washington State are applied
nationwide, blacks will be almost totally excluded from admission to the
nation's highest-ranked colleges and universities. The reason for this is
that only a very tiny percentage of college-bound black students score at
the top of the SAT scale.
Under the SAT scoring system, students hoping to qualify for
admission
to any of the nation's 25 highest-ranked universities and 25 highest-ranked
liberal arts colleges need to score at least 700 on each portion of the SAT.
For admission to the very highest ranked, brand-name schools
such as Princeton or MIT, applicants realistically need scores of 750 to be
considered for admission. Yet, as we shall see, only a minute percentage
of black test takers score at these levels. Thus, in a race-neutral admissions
environment, high-ranking colleges and universities will choose their first-
year students from a pool in which there will be very few blacks.
Let's be more specific about the SAT racial gap among
high-scoring applicants. In 2002, 122,684 African Americans took the SAT test.
They
made up 9.2% of all SAT test takers. But only 838 African-American college-bound
students scored 700 or above on the math SAT and only
822 scored at least 700 on the verbal SAT. Nationally, 83,689 students of
all races scored 700 or above on the math SAT and 59,662 students
scored 700 or above on the verbal SAT. Thus, in this top-scoring category
of all SAT test takers, blacks make up only 1% of the students scoring 700
or higher on the math test and only 1.4% of the students scoring 700 or
higher on the verbal SAT.
If we eliminate Asians and other minorities from the
statistics and
compare just white and black students, we find that 5.1% of all white SAT
test takers scored 700 or above on the verbal portion of the test. But only
0.7% of all black SAT test takers scored at this level. Therefore, whites
were more than seven times as likely as blacks to score 700 or above on
the verbal SAT. Overall, there are more than 43 times as many whites as
blacks who scored at least 700 on the verbal SAT.
On the math SAT, only 0.7% of all black test takers scored at
least 700 compared to 6.2% of all white test takers. Thus, whites were nearly
nine
times as likely as blacks to score 700 or above on the math SAT. Overall,
there were 51 times as many whites as blacks who scored 700 or above
on the math SAT.
If we raise the top-scoring threshold to students scoring 750
or above
on both the math and verbal SAT - a level equal to the mean score of
students entering the nation's most selective colleges such as Harvard,
Princeton, and CalTech - we find that in the entire country 195 blacks
scored 750 or above on the math SAT and 218 black students scored
750 or above on the verbal portion of the test. Nationwide, 26,838 students
scored at least 750 on the math test and 20,160 scored at least 750 on
the verbal SAT. Therefore, black students make up 0.7% of the test takers
who scored 750 or above on the math test and 1% of all test takers who
scored 750 or above on the verbal section.
Once again, if we eliminate Asians and other minorities from
the
calculations and compare only blacks and whites, we find that 0.18% of all
black test takers scored 750 or above on the verbal SAT compared to
1.7% of all white test takers. Thus, whites were nearly 10 times as likely
as blacks to score 750 or above on the verbal portion of the test. Overall,
there were 54 times as many whites as blacks who scored at or above the
750 level.
On the math SAT, only 0.16% of all black test takers scored
750 or
above compared to 1.8% of white test takers. Thus, whites were more than
11 times as likely as blacks to score 750 or above on the math SAT.
Overall, there were 65 times as many whites as blacks who scored 750
or above on the math section of the SAT.
In a race-neutral competition for the approximately 50,000
places for
first-year students at the nation's 25 highest-ranked universities, high-
scoring blacks will be buried by a huge mountain of high-scoring nonblack
students. Today, under prevailing affirmative action admissions policies,
there are about 3,000 black first-year students matriculating at these 25
high-ranking universities, about 6% of all first-year students at these
institutions. But if these schools operated under a strict race-neutral
admissions policy where SAT scores were the most important qualifying yardstick,
these universities could fill their freshman classes almost
exclusively with students who score at the very top of the SAT scoring
scale. As shown previously, black students make up at best between
1% and 2% of these high-scoring groups.
If the nation now insists on race-blind college admissions,
it must face
the near certainty that the percentage of black students at the nation's
highest-ranked colleges and universities will drop from the present
average of about 6% to 2% or less.
10/02 The Journal of Blacks in Higher Education.
In 1997, prior to the ban on race-based admissions, 515 black students
were admitted to the University of California at Berkeley. This spring 290 black
students were admitted to Berkeley, a drop of more than 43%.
At UCLA 32% fewer black students were admitted this year than was
the case in 1997 when race-based admissions were permitted at the University
of California system.
The medical school of the University of California at San Diego has only
one black student currently enrolled, down from 14 black students three years
ago.
At the medical school of the University of California at San Francisco,
black enrollments are down 31% over the past three years.
At the UCLA business school, black enrollments are down 42% from
three years ago when race-based admissions was allowed.
At Berkeley's Haas School of Business, black enrollments have
dropped 29% over the past three years.
10/10/02 Sacramento Bee: "Diversity
rises at UC med, law schools. The university says efforts to lure
underrepresented students are 'beginning to
show success.'"
The percentage of underrepresented
students enrolling in the University
of California's medical and law schools went up this year, UC officials said
Wednesday.
At UC's five medical schools, the
proportion of first-year American Indian, African American and Latino students
rose to 16.5% in fall of 2002 from
11.9% in 2001.
Such enrollments also climbed at
UC's three law schools, to 16.2% this
year from 11% in 2001, UC officials said in a statement.
The number of underrepresented
students in the law and medical schools
fell after voters passed the anti-affirmative action initiative Proposition 209.
Before the 1996 initiative, the proportion of underrepresented minorities
consistently was greater than 20%, UC officials said.
Earlier this year, Lt. Gov. Cruz
Bustamante called on the UC regents to implement a new comprehensive
admissions-review policy approved for undergraduates. On Wednesday, Bustamante
said "we need to have
admissions based on merit, through comprehensive review, at medical
schools, law schools and graduate programs in the UC system."
The number of first-year
underrepresented students in medical school went
up at all campuses with that program: Davis, Irvine, Los Angeles, San Diego
and Berkeley. UC statistics did not separate the numbers by race or ethnicity.
At UC law schools, the numbers were
broken out. At UC Davis, the
percentage of underrepresented American Indians stayed at 0.5%. The percentage
increased among African Americans to 4.2% from 1.9% and
rose among Latinos to 11.6% from 6.5%. UC Berkeley showed increases
among American Indians and Latinos, but not African Americans. UCLA saw
increases in the percentage of African Americans, but lost ground among American
Indians and Latinos.
10/3/02 The Dartmouth: "Steinberg '88 examines the admissions
process,"
Jacques Steinberg (Dartmouth '88) takes a sympathetic view of the college
admissions process in his new book, The Gatekeepers. Steinberg spent
the 1999-2000 school year shadowing the work of Ralph Figueroa, an admissions
officer at Wesleyan University in Middletown, Conn. Steinberg acknowledged that
the admissions process could often be "personal" and
"idiosyncratic," even "arbitrary." Steinberg's account of
Figueroa's reactions
to the applications of Tiffany Wang and Aggie Ramirez nicely demonstrates
this idiosyncrasy. Wang scored a 1470 on the SAT I, well above Wesleyan's
average, and has taken six Advanced Placement courses to date. Ramirez scored
1090 and received a smattering of C's and D's in her senior year. Nonetheless,
Figueroa, after much deliberation, assigned Wang a "deny
plus" and Ramirez an "admit minus." He sensed -- from Tiffany's
relatively
low class ranking and a teacher's recommendation saying she was surprised
that Tiffany made National Merit Semifinalist -- that Tiffany had not challenged
herself as she should have in high school. By contrast, Ramirez had already
won a scholarship to a private boarding school in Maryland, been elected
president of her class and thrown herself into extracurricular activities.
Ultimately, both Wang and Ramirez made Wesleyan's wait list.
5/17/02 The Daily Northwestern: "Northwestern University not fazed by
U. of Michigan decision,"
Rice University in Houston switched to race-blind admissions
and financial aid selections in 1996 following a rule that forbade the
Texas university from using race as an admissions factor.
Rice's minority numbers "dramatically" dropped from 12%
Latino and 7% black in 1996's incoming freshman class to 8% Latino
and 4% black the following year, said Ann Wright, vice president for
enrollment at Rice.
The decision also prevented the university from using race in
awarding financial aid packages and giving minority students more
grants than loans, Wright said.
A reorganization of Rice's admissions office helped the university
expand its minority recruitment nationwide, and the school's minority
numbers were on the rise by 1999, Wright said.
5/18/02 Associated Press: "Vanderbilt recruitment produces unease,"
Jews account for about 4% of Vanderbilts enrollment of 10,500,
compared with more than 20% at Ivy League schools. About 2% of the US
population is Jewish.
Last year's college-bound Jewish seniors averaged 1,161 out of a
possible 1,600 on the SAT, second only to Unitarians among 35 religions,
according to the College Board, which administers the exam.
As recently as the 1960s, some top universities used quotas to hold
down Jewish enrollment. During the 1970s, Jewish enrollment at Vanderbilt
was 9% or 10%, but it slipped as Ivy League and other prestigious
universities abandoned the quotas.
5/15/02 Oakland Tribune:
"Affirmative action ruling gets UC Berkeley's
attention"
In a decision that may have implications for California's ban
on racial
preferences, a federal appeals court in Detroit, Mich., ruled Tuesday that
the University of Michigan law school can continue to base admissions
partly on race.
UM argued that without racial preferences the number of African
American
and Latino students would drop sharply, denying both minority students and
members of the racial majority the benefit of a diverse student population.
The university attorneys cited the experience of Boalt Hall law
school at UC Berkeley.
When racial preferences were banned by the UC Regents in 1997, no
African Americans, no American Indians and just seven Latino students were
admitted to the entering class that year. An African American admitted the
previous year under affirmative action, who delayed entering until 1997, was
the only African American in the class.
The fall 2002 entering class at Boalt includes 14 African
Americans, 17
Latinos and one American Indian student -- 11% of the class of 299 students.
In 1996, before the ban, there were 15 African Americans, 28 Latino students
and one American Indian.
4/9/02 washingtonpost.com
The number of African American and Hispanic students being
offered admission to Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology in
September has more than tripled from a year ago, from nine students to 30.
Officials mailed letters of acceptance last week to 449
eighth-graders across Northern Virginia for what could be the largest freshman
class ever at Jefferson, a regional magnet school in the Alexandria section of
Fairfax.
African American and Hispanic students make up 25% of all
eighth-graders.
Jefferson is ranked among the
nation's best public high schools. Admission
to Jefferson is as competitive as it is for an Ivy League university. Students
must take a multiple-choice test and submit grades, teacher recommendations, a
list of extracurricular activities and an essay. An estimated 800 semifinalists
are selected from test results and grades, and 15 members of the admissions
committee read each application before the finalists are offered admission.
This year, a record 3,000 students from Arlington, Loudoun, Prince William,
Fauquier and Fairfax counties and Falls Church applied.
Ten African Americans and 20
Hispanic students have been admitted to Jefferson's Class of 2006. The current
freshman class -- the Class of 2005 --
has two blacks and seven Latino students.
In recent months, several changes
have been made in Jefferson's admissions process. Officials gave every applicant
a 16-page booklet of sample test questions and test-taking tips. The school's
PTSA diversity committee held a reception for all minority applicants and
organized two test-prep courses for them.
Not all minorities are in short
supply at Jefferson: 130 Asians were offered admission last week. No Native
Americans were, however.
Next year, the school district will
offer a test-prep course for about 225 students, and several School Board
members have said they hope preference will be given to students from Fairfax
middle schools that don't typically send many students to Jefferson.
Officials expanded the freshman
class for September and have offered admission to 29 students from these
underrepresented middle schools. One of those students is black, none is
Hispanic.
4/7/02 New York Times: "Admission Up
for Minorities in California,"
Offers of admission to black, Hispanic and American Indian
students in the University of California system have rebounded to levels above
where they
were before race and ethnicity were banned from the selection process.
The university voted in 1995 to
prohibit consideration of race, ethnicity and
sex in admissions. The policy took effect in 1998. California voters approved a
broader prohibition in 1996 covering hiring, contracting and university
admissions.
Before comprehensive review,
campuses used a two-tier process in which
the first 50% to 75% of the freshman class was admitted based solely on
grade-point averages and test scores. The second tier took into account factors
like the number of advanced courses available to the student in high school,
participation in extracurricular activities and leadership skills.
Admission of blacks, Hispanics and
American Indians, categorized as underrepresented minorities because of their
low proportion in the system's eligibility pool, had fallen off drastically as
consideration of race and ethnicity
was eliminated from the review process.
The University of California
changed expanded the factors used in the selection process to include
information like a student's success in overcoming economic and educational
disadvantages. The policy, known as comprehensive review, was criticized by some
as bringing affirmative action in through a back door.
In recent years, minorities
numbers had begun to increase. For those minority students recently offered
admission for next fall, the number reached 19.1%, compared with 18.8% in the
fall of 1997. The number fell to 16.7% in 1998.
4/6/02 Associated
Press: "Calif. minority admissions top level reached in
1997,"
San Diego - For the first time since it abolished affirmative
action, the University of California system has admitted more minority students
than it
did during the last days of its race-based admissions policies. Of the
48,369 students admitted to this fall's freshman class, 19.1% were from
Hispanic, black, or American Indian backgrounds. That is up from 18.8% in
1997, the last year the public university system used race as a factor in
admission.
The University of California, San Diego, saw the greatest
leap in
admissions of minority students, from 11.5% last year to 14.4% in 2002.
Officials also gave credit
for the gains to an investment by the state in
targeting underrepresented students. Critics of affirmative action embraced
the figures as proof that race has no place in the admissions process. ''I
don't mean to gloat, but I told you so,'' said Ward Connerly, a regent at the
University of California, who is black. ''We've been saying for a long time
that these kids don't need any special treatment to get into the UC system.''
Following the ban on
race-based admissions policies in 1998, the level
of underrepresented students admitted dropped sharply. Since then, the
numbers have returned to 1997 levels at some campuses. Despite the
gains for the system as a whole, the number of minority students admitted
to the university's most competitive campuses has not had the same
rebound. At UCLA, for example, the new freshman class has more black
and Hispanic students than last year, but its total number of minority
admissions, 1,675, is still below the 2,010 the campus accepted in 1997.
Berkeley and Irvine also have not returned to 1997 levels.
4/5/02 Daily California (Berkeley): "Berkeley Admits First Class
Using Comprehensive Review: Percentage of Underrepresented Minorities
Admitted Increases Slightly,"
For the fourth year since racial preferences were banned from the
UC admissions process, the number of underrepresented minorities admitted to
UC Berkeley remained below levels established during the affirmative action
era.
The percentage of admits belonging to underrepresented minority
groups increased slightly over last year, continuing a trend of gradual increase
that
began after underrepresented minority admittance sharply fell in 1998.
In 1997, 22% of admits were American Indian, African American or
Latino.
In 1998 that number fell to 10%. At 15.9%, the statistic slightly increased this
year over last. But with significant changes to university policy taking effect
since last year's class was admitted, some officials had hoped for a more marked
increase in minority enrollment.
The 2002 admits were the first class selected using the
comprehensive admissions process that replaced a two-tiered system that accepted
some students solely based on academics. And last summer, the UC Board of
Regents repealed the university provisions that banned affirmative action,
a move that had only symbolic significance because racial preferences
are still banned in state agencies by Proposition 209.
Assistant Vice Chancellor for Admissions and Enrollment Richard
Black
said the numbers were not surprising. He also said that despite expectations
by some that the new admissions process would greatly boost minority enrollment,
UC Berkeley admissions officials did not expect comprehensive review would
significantly alter demographics. "This is really the fairest and
most thorough review we have ever had," Black said.
But because of constraints on the campus's growth, UC Berkeley
officials reduced the number of students admitted from last year, accepting
8,492 students, 215 fewer than the previous year. The reduction ends a
three-year
trend of slow growth that is needed to accommodate an influx of students born
of baby boomers, called Tidal Wave II.
With a record number of students applying for admission to UC
Berkeley
and fewer being accepted, the campus became more competitive this spring. This
year, only 23% of applicants were admitted.
Because fewer students were admitted, a move also required because
more and more students are accepting the offer to attend UC Berkeley, the
numbers of students admitted in all ethnic groups declined. The largest
decline by percentage of the class was among American Indians, as only 42
were admitted.
The UC system as a whole grew 4.9% this year, despite the decline
in the number of admits at its flagship campus. Slots as undergraduates at the
eight
UC campuses were offered to 48,369 students. In the system over all, the
number of underrepresented minorities did increase by 648 admits.
Latinos saw the biggest boost, with 515 additional acceptance
letters
being sent to members of the ethnic group.
UC spokesperson Hanan Eisenman said comprehensive
review had only a "modest impact" on the minority enrollment increase,
and instead credited outreach efforts for the gains.
Black said he hoped the regent's repeal of their affirmative action
ban also played a role in greater minority acceptance. The regents' repeal was
intended
to replace a welcome mat for minorities that some said had been yanked out along
with affirmative action. The number of UC applications from minorities
did increase this year as they did the previous year.
The number of applications from whites also climbed. The Berkeley
campus also received more applications from all ethnic groups except American
Indians.
4/2/02 washingtonpost.com:
"College Applicants Urged to Take Cue From SAT Scores Pick School With
Comparable Students Or Risk Falling Behind, Educators Say"
George Mason University
professor Walter E. Williams is concerned about the impact on minority students
recruited to competitive schools despite mediocre scores. "It is an
academic mismatch," said Williams, who is also a columnist and radio
commentator. "You say to me, 'Mr. Williams, teach me to box,' and the first
match I get for you is with Lennox Lewis. You are going to get your brains
beaten out."
Substandard scores on the SAT or the rival ACT do not
necessarily reflect on a student's intelligence, Williams and other experts say.
Rather, lower scores often signal less preparation for the literary and
mathematical demands of college. Several studies show that students with lower
SAT scores, on average, tend to have lower rates of graduation at very
competitive colleges. Experts say low scores might also affect students in a
different way, creating a psychological burden for all but the most
self-confident teenagers.
Williams cites the work of fellow economist Thomas Sowell of
the Hoover Institution at Stanford University, who has been critical of
affirmative-action policies that admit more minorities despite academic
weaknesses. In his 1992 book "Inside American Education: The Decline, the
Deception, the Dogmas," Sowell asks, "What was accomplished by
admitting more black students and graduating fewer?"
Williams, who also opposes affirmative-action programs, says
students will be happier and more productive in schools at their level, and
other experts agree. Harvard University historian Stephan Thernstrom cites a
1996 report in the journal Research in Higher Education showing that African
Americans appear more likely to earn doctorates if they attend historically
black colleges or urban universities, such as Wayne State in Detroit, that are
less selective but have large minority enrollments. "The explanation, I
think, is that you don't decide you're going to become a political scientist,
historian or chemist unless you are one of the top students in that field in
your college," Thernstrom said.
Some universities say they are working to bolster the
academic strengths of the lower-SAT-scoring students they admit. At the
University of Virginia, the average SAT score of African American undergraduates
entering in 1995 was 1036, nearly 200 points below the 1227 average of that
entire entering class. But the percentage of African Americans in the class
graduating six years later was high, 83.3% compared with 92.1% for the class.
1/1/02 Orange County Register:
"Hispanics Under-represented in Gifted-
Student Programs,"
Latinos were nearly 15% of Orange County's 37,759 gifted
students last year, about the same as the year before, though they were 42% of
enrollment overall, the largest group in the county's public schools, according
to the state Department of Education.
Anglo students were 57% of
the gifted enrollment, and 41% of students overall. Asians were 24% of the
gifted, double their total enrollment in public schools.
Gifted programs aim to serve students with superior academic
achievement or a skill in the arts, offering them a curriculum that allows them
to excel and expand their skills at their own pace instead of forcing them to
work at the level of their classmates.
Statewide, Hispanics are nearly 21% of gifted students and
43% of the overall population.
In Orange County, the gap
persists even in 10 of the 14 districts where Hispanics outnumber Asians or
Anglos. In Fullerton's high school district, 1,423 of the 2,488 Asians, or
57%, are listed as gifted in the state report. Hispanics are the district's
largest group overall, but 590 of the 6,824 are gifted.
In Fullerton's elementary
and middle schools, which are 43% Hispanic, the main gifted programs are at
schools that serve mostly white or Asian students. The district has 5,677
Hispanic students, but last year 12 were classified as gifted, compared with 202
Anglos and 175 Asians.
11/13/01 Washington Post: "Thomas Jefferson To Expand Admissions,"
Fairfax County school
officials, trying to increase diversity at the elite Thomas Jefferson High
School for Science and Technology, agreed last night to increase the freshman
class by 20 qualified students from underrepresented middle schools in the
county.
The proposal, by School
Board Chairman Jane K. Strauss (Dranesville), would keep admissions procedures
essentially the same until an estimated 400 students are selected. Then the
admissions committee would admit 20 more semifinalists who live in the Route 1
corridor and other areas that typically don't send students to Jefferson.
Strauss said the change would add diversity to the student body while
maintaining the school's high academic standards. "We want to open doors
for all children," Strauss said.
The change would not go as
far as School Superintendent Daniel A. Domenech's plan to address the lack of
diversity. His idea -- to sort qualified semifinalists by middle school to
ensure more geographic diversity -- was denounced by many parents in the McLean
and Great Falls areas as a quota system. It was considered but rejected at a
work session last night.
Fairfax school
administrators are under pressure to address what local officials have called an
embarrassing decline of some minority groups at Jefferson. This year, only two
blacks and seven Hispanics are among the school's ninth-graders -- an all-time
low.
For years, admissions
committees would admit black and Hispanic students who failed to make the pool
of 800 semifinalists but seemed otherwise qualified, according to Domenech. In
the past, as many as 39 black students and 23 Latino students have been added to
the yearly list of semifinalists. Last year, students benefiting from that
procedure had a grade-point average of 3.58 as seniors at Jefferson, the
superintendent said.
School attorneys advised
administrators to abandon the practice in 1998 after federal court rulings ended
several affirmative action and school desegregation programs nationwide.
Afterward, minority enrollment at Jefferson began to decline.
10/22/01 UCLA Daily Bruin Online: "Comprehensive review is more efficient.
Admissions: Process must take Life Challenges into account, promote
diversity,"
| UC Berkeley: Freshman Admission
Rates |
Black |
Hispanic |
| 1995 |
50.1 |
55.1 |
| 1996 |
49.6 |
49.1 |
| 1997 |
49.6 |
45.8 |
| 1998 |
20.3 |
20.8 |
| 1999 |
28.2 |
27.9 |
| 2000 |
28.4 |
24.4 |
| UCLA: Freshman Admission Rates |
Black |
Hispanic |
| 1995 |
47.7 |
53.8 |
| 1996 |
41.8 |
45.3 |
| 1997 |
38.4 |
40.8 |
| 1998 |
23.6 |
24.5 |
| 1999 |
23.9 |
25.2 |
| 2000 |
22.0 |
25.2 |
Race could not longer be used
in college admissions, after the University of California Regents' adopted SP-1
and California voters passed Proposition 209. As a result, the University
of California could no longer engage in reverse discrimination against
Asian-Americans. Between 1997 and 1998, both Berkeley and UCLA admitted
fewer blacks and Hispanics, as shown in the above tables.
Underrepresented students
have consistently scored lower than average on the SAT. In the latest
results, African-American students scored 200 points below the national average,
while Mexican- American students scored 150 points below the national average.
The first tier of students admitted to UCLA based on academic rank (62% in the
last admissions cycle) included only 7% of underrepresented students.
1018/01 Harvard Crimson: "Minority Students Favored, Study Finds,"
A study released Tuesday by the University of Massachusetts
at Amherst found that New England colleges often favor minority students who
meet minimum admissions standards over white students who are just as, or even
better, qualified.
Dispelling a common myth concerning affirmative action, the
study, which surveyed 200 regional colleges, found that most schools are not
"lowering the bar" to ensure that enough minority students enroll.
Rather, once minority students reach the minimum standards, they are accepted at
higher rates than their white counterparts. In only a few cases were minority
students accepted instead of more qualified white students in the applicant pool
considered in the study.
Harvard officials say they do not use affirmative action in
their admissions policies. "Harvard College admissions does not and never
has" used any methods which could properly be called "affirmative
action," Director of Admissions Marlyn McGrath Lewis said.
McGrath Lewis did,
however, confirm the Colleges use of active recruitment of ethnic and
minority groups. Minorities who have shown themselves to be very talented
academically and in extracurriculars are targeted with direct mailings and
alumni recruitment. "Recruitment is not the same as admission. Every
applicant competes against every other applicant for available spaces with no
targets or quotas or goals," McGrath Lewis said.
Rather than targeting race or ethnicity alone, Harvard
College admission policies look more closely at what McGrath Lewis calls an
applicants "surround," which includes things like ones family,
ethnicity and hometown. "We pay great attention to what [applicants] have
done with their circumstances. We think not just about their given surround but
also what theyve done with it," she said.
McGrath Lewis did allow that if a minority student applicant
is considered completely equal in the application process to another
non-minority applicant, the minority student will win the tie at least 50
percent of the time, if not more often. "At that point, we dont stand
back from admitting someone who would bring us something very valuable. But we
dont automatically tip for anyone. No one gets in simply because of the box
they checked," McGrath Lewis said.
Harvard history professor Stephan Thernstrom, whose 1998
inquiry about racial preferencing at UMass - Amherst indirectly prompted the new
study, said many New England schools are guilty of using a racial double
standard.
"To say that everyone admitted under the racial double
standard is just as qualified is just a game of semantics. Though Harvard
practices very little, if any, racial preferencing because it has such a
phenomenal applicant pool, thats not typical. Most schools dont have such
a strong applicant pool, so there are some students who get in because of their
race," Thernstrom said.
According to Thernstrom, racial preferencing in college
admissions affirms instead of rejects racial stereotypes. Certain minority
groups have higher dropout rates than white students, which Thernstrom
attributes to the placement of minority students into the wrong schools because
of racial preferencing.
"Its not good when members of an identifiable
minority are also overrepresented in the students who are doing poorly
academically. Of course, there are minority students who are just as qualified
as whites, but many of those admitted by racial preferencing are not,"
Thernstrom said.
10/18/01 letter from Dr. Ed Chin
Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology in Fairfax County, VA is
one of the most, if not the most, academically excellent magnet secondary
schools in the nation. This year, it had the most National Merit
Semi-Finalists in the nation, with a 151 out of 400 students. It also had
the highest number for 11 of the last 12 years. Asian-Americans are the
largest minority group at the school, with over 30% of the students.
Admission is granted solely on merit: grades and test scores. The
admissions policy is currently race-blind. The Fairfax County School Board is
considering geographic quotas which would be de facto racial quotas and result
in reverse discrimination against Asian-Americans.
10/18/01 Washington Post, p. VA03: "Admissions Policy Due For Magnet High
School,"
School officials are planning to decide within the next month
on a new admissions policy for Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and
Technology, despite the uproar the issue is causing in some areas of Fairfax
County.
Superintendent Daniel A. Domenech and members of the county
School Board have received "hundreds" of e-mails in the last two
weeks, many of them opposing Domenech's proposal to increase enrollment from
areas, such as Route 1, that send relatively few students to the magnet school.
An estimated 200 parents attended a meeting last week to hear
the School Board debate the issue, but no public comment was allowed.
Domenech's plan would preserve the requirement that all
applicants to attend the magnet school pass a rigorous verbal and math test and
submit their grades.
But the 800 semifinalists for admission would be sorted
by the middle school for their neighborhood, which would be assigned a certain
number of spots at Thomas Jefferson according to eighth-grade enrollment.
The effect would be that
students from middle schools with a lot of applicants would have a tougher time
getting accepted than students from middle schools with fewer applicants. About
400 students are accepted to the magnet school each year.
School officials deny that the plan was conceived to boost
the number of minority students enrolled at Jefferson. But administrators are
under pressure to reverse an embarrassing trend: Only two blacks and seven
Hispanics are in the school's freshman class -- an all-time low, according to
some officials. The number of county residents who consider themselves
minorities grew from 23% of the population in 1990 to 36% in 2000, according to
the U.S. Census. [10/18/01 Washington Post: Asian-Americans grew from 8.5%
to 13.1%, Hispanics 6.8% to 11% and African-Americans 7.7% to 8.6%. Other
race and mixed race comprised 3.3% in 2000.]
Domenech said the dearth of minorities reflects a 1990 change
in school regulations that forbade Jefferson's admissions committee from
considering "potentially successful underrepresented minority
students" in addition to the annual pool of 800 semifinalists. The change
was made to adhere to federal court rulings that rolled back several
affirmative-action programs.
At the Oct. 11 meeting, a divided School Board debated
Domenech's proposal but did not come to any consensus. Technically, the board
does not need to vote on the plan because it is considered a regulation. But
Domenech said he would not go forward with it if a majority of School Board
members didn't support his plan or something similar.
10/16/2001 Boston Globe: "Affirmative action is found strong at colleges in N.E."
Minority high school students who meet minimum admissions standards
are more likely to be accepted to New England colleges than white students with
similar or even stronger applications, according to a new study of
affirmative action at 200 campuses in the region.
Despite legal defeats to race-based admissions in Massachusetts, Texas,
and other states, most New England colleges use affirmative action to guarantee
that enough minority students enroll.
Educators at dozens of campuses told the study's authors that, despite
nationwide school overhauls in the 1990s, they receive so few minority
applicants that they need some form of affirmative action to ensure that
campuses do not become overwhelmingly white.
The authors of the study, two education professors at the University of
Massachusetts at Amherst, stressed that colleges were not admitting
underqualified minority applicants. Virtually all minority students accepted by
New England schools, they found, met the minimum admissions threshold that
their white peers also passed.
''We found that colleges are neither lowering standards for minorities
nor using alternative standards for minorities, as many Americans still
falsely assume,'' said Joe Berger, one of the professors who conducted the
study. ''They are all qualified.''
The study examined academic records of students accepted by
UMass-Amherst, the other five New England public flagship universities, and
most private colleges in the region.
Berger and his colleague, Stephen Coelen, analyzed 250,000 student
applications from 1995 to 1999. Within the pool of qualified applicants
- students who met each school's minimum requirements for grades and SATs
- they found that most New England four-year colleges were accepting
minority students at higher rates than they accepted white students,
particularly at highly selective private universities. Although the report did not cite
specific instances, it also found that some minority students in the
applicant pool were being admitted ahead of more-qualified whites.
Berger said that since all of the students met the same minimum
qualifications, minority students were not being cut slack academically, as
some people presume. Yet critics of affirmative action yesterday
attacked his view as misleading.
''If minorities are accepted even though they're not as qualified as a
lot of people who are turned down, that's a problem,'' said Stephan
Thernstrom, a Harvard University history professor whose 1998 inquiry about
race-based preferences at UMass-Amherst indirectly prompted this latest study.
Although Americans remain sharply divided over affirmative action,
colleges have been quietly using such policies for years. Many New England
schools give a special edge to black, Hispanic, and Native American applicants,
making ethnicity one of several nonacademic factors considered in admissions.
Athletes and children of alumni often receive such boosts, too.
Race-based policies at several state universities have been challenged
in court as violations of the US Constitution's equal protection clause.
These cases, including two lawsuits against the University of Michigan, could
eventually lead the US Supreme Court to rule definitively on the use of
race in admissions.
The new study is the first major assessment of affirmative action in
New England since a federal appeals court struck down Boston Latin School's
race-based admissions policy in November 1998. That ruling faulted
Boston Latin for ''racial balancing,'' a legally suspect practice in which a
school manipulates entrance standards to enroll specific numbers of white,
black, Hispanic, and Asian students.
Although that decision applied specifically to high school admissions,
selective colleges use much the same body of law to defend their
admissions systems, and the ruling prompted many colleges to review their
practices. Early in 1999, UMass-Amherst cited the ruling in announcing that race
would no longer be a ''major factor'' in admissions decisions.
Today, blacks and Hispanics make up 19% of the population of 18-
to 24-year-olds in New England, but only 10% of colleges' population in
the region.
Many colleges have found other ways to broaden diversity, according to
the study, commissioned by the Nellie Mae Education Foundation, which works
on behalf of minority and low-income students. More than one in five colleges
are putting greater emphasis today on admitting ''strivers'' - students who
perform well academically despite coming from low-income backgrounds.
Yet almost 20% of schools said that race or ethnicity was becoming a
more important factor, a significant finding, given how California, Washington,
and some colleges moved aggressively in the late '90s to end affirmative action
because it was seen as unfair to white and Asian students.
The reason, the authors say, is that most colleges want a large yield
of minority students who will come to their campuses.
8/30/01 Washington Post: "Reporting of SAT Scores Revamped,"
Fairfax County, VA school officials have changed their method of reporting SAT
results in a way that raises overall scores and gives a clearer picture of how
minority students are faring. Fairfax officials double-checked the
ethnic identity of each test-taker because they said the College Board figures
consistently undercount the number of minority and ethnic students.
Fairfax data show the district average was 552 on the verbal section of the test
and 564 on the math segment. National scores were 506 and 514.
Average scores for Asian-American students were 523 in verbal and 582 in math.
Average scores for Latino students were 492 verbal and 497 math. Average
scores for African American students were 473 in verbal and 468 in math.
Average scores for white students were 574 in verbal and 468 in
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