Eboni Zamani-Gallaher, the director of the Office of Community College Research and Leadership and a professor of higher education/community college leadership at the University of Illinois, is an expert on affirmative action in higher education. Zamani-Gallaher spoke recently with News Bureau education editor Sharita Forrest about the U.S. Justice Department’s plans to investigate possible racial discrimination in college and university admissions policies.
In announcing the Justice Department’s investigation, federal officials said the initiative was prompted by allegations of discrimination against Asian-Americans in a complaint filed by a coalition of Asian-American associations. However, some media suggested that the administration is actually interested in ferreting out reverse discrimination against white students. Is there evidence that admissions policies are marginalizing either group?
I found it quite interesting, though not surprising, that the Justice Department is targeting affirmative action as a form of reverse discrimination by seeking attorneys to “investigate and possibly litigate intentional race-based discrimination” in college admissions, according to an internal DOJ memo. President Trump was elected in part due to the perceived threat posed by the demographic changes occurring in American society. Diversity is not a compelling state interest under this administration and is viewed as coming at the expense of whites, so this investigation panders to Trump’s base of white nationalist supporters.
Placing Asian-American students at the center of the new case against affirmative action is complex and layered. In 1996, much of the disfavor surrounding affirmative action, which led to the referendum Proposition 209 in California, was in response to the overrepresentation of Asian-American students at University of California’s Los Angeles and Berkeley campuses. However, after race-conscious college admissions were banned in California, its enrollments of Asian-American students increased.
Scholars such as Frank Wu, Julie Park, Oiyan Poon and Michael Omi illustrate how layered and loaded the politics of race are – and assert that right-wing conservatives are inserting Asian-Americans into the debate to further a retrenchment agenda to overturn affirmative action.
In 2016, the Supreme Court ruled in Fisher v. University of Texas at Austin that universities can consider race among various other factors in their admissions decisions. Is this investigation likely to undermine that decision?
Given the narrow upholding of affirmative action in admissions at the University of Texas at Austin by the Supreme Court with a single vote just last year, and the Trump administration’s focus on rolling back many progressive policies and programs, I can see why the Trump administration is spearheading this next.
Since its inception, affirmative action has been contested, though there is a curious selective reframing of nepotism and quid pro quo by conservatives. For instance, legacy admissions and diversity scholarships that boost the enrollment of whites at historically black colleges and universities generally are not challenged.
Race in college admissions decisions is what is commonly criticized, unlike gender-based or class-specific forms of affirmative action. In legal case after legal case, such as Fisher v. University of Texas at Austin, white students contended that college admittance was denied to them because of a black or brown student. That assumption is noteworthy when there were no challenges to the qualifications of white students who were accepted during the same admissions cycle.
Do admissions policies need to become race- and gender-neutral to ensure candidates are evaluated on individual merit alone?
American institutions historically did not voluntarily seek diversity, and without the introduction of federal policies compelling them to do so, they would not have made diversity an imperative.
Affirmative action has been referred to as tokenism, preferential treatment, quotas and reverse discrimination, and viewed as compromising merit and stigmatizing its beneficiaries. It boldly sought to hold American institutions accountable for broadening access and opportunity, but does not afford special treatment, fulfill quotas or guarantee placement.
Affirmative action doesn’t need to end – because there has never been impartiality to begin with. There is still disparate access, participation and outcomes, by race or ethnicity, gender and class.
We need race-conscious, gender-specific and class-based forms of affirmative action programming exactly because the status quo is still in effect.
Aside from race, are there other demographic characteristics or personal qualities such as determination to overcome financial hardships that predict which students are likely to succeed at college and that could promote diversity in college admissions?
There is much to be attributed to student resilience and persistence as key predictors in college success. Merit should not and cannot be reduced to strictly numerical criteria of GPA, class rank and ACT or SAT scores, as these give an incomplete profile of the student.
In determining which students are likely to succeed in college, admissions officials consider students in their entirety – their interests, types of courses taken, extracurricular activities, leadership skills, talents, personal circumstances, etc.
The Justice Department under the Trump administration doesn’t see affirmative action as a compelling state interest or care about the uneven playing field but advocates a return to what is thought to be natural social order – when women weren’t trying to crack the glass ceiling, racial and ethnic minorities knew their place and poor people were an afterthought.
We are in jeopardy of losing the richness that a broad mix of people from different backgrounds contributes to learning, global understanding, cultural awareness, intercultural communication, and personal and professional growth.
All told, there still needs to be compensatory policies to eradicate the effects of past discrimination and eliminate present-day discrimination on many levels.