Staff EDITORIAL: That's affirmative

In a landmark decision Monday, the Supreme Court held that race can be a factor in college admissions. The court stressed, however, that affirmative action is no longer based upon the need to compensate for past racism and discrimination, but on a desire to reap the benefits of a racially and ethically diverse environment in America's universities. As a result, colleges should not strive to fill racial quotas or admit students based solely on race, but should value diversity when selecting their incoming classes.

The Court ruled in a split decision, striking down a system at the University of Michigan's undergraduate school which assigned students point values in a number of categories, and made admissions decisions based upon the totals. Students of racial and ethnic minority groups were awarded bonus points equal to a full GPA point. This pracitice was determined to be unconstitutional, and discriminatory towards non-minority students. Michigan claimed that such an objective system was necessary in order to process the 25,000 applications they receive each year.

On the flip side, the court ruled 5-4 to uphold the policy of Michigan's law school, which gives race less prominence than the undergruate school and does not award minority students a set bonus on the grounds of race. This does not involve a quota, but improves the odds for minority students.

The Court's decision is reflective of the notion that affirmative action policies with regard to admissions should not be tailored to meet generic quotas, but geared toward obtaining the benefits that result from a diverse student body. Using a point scale reduces race to a blunt measure rather than an attribute of the student as a whole. Colleges should value diversity, yet should not quantify it like SAT scores or an extracurricular activity. Future college admissions policies must be flexible and make the effort to evaluate the student as a whole person. At large state schools that process a large volume of applications, this may mean hiring more admissions officials to go through applications.

More generally, the ruling points to the fact that a traditional conception of affirmative action has failed to close the gap between minority and non-minority students in many respects. As it stands, affirimative action serves to address educational inequality from the top-down. Students gain access to educational reasources after their formative years have already passed, when learning habits have already been formed. In many cases, minorities arrive at college unprepared due to poor elementary and high school preparation. Further, non-minority students, and some minority students themselves often assume that their admission was the result of affirmative action as opposed to hard work. This would also ensure that affirmative action would benefit lower and middle class minority families, and not only the exceptional minority students who have money and access to the top schools.

Minorities and society as a whole would undoubtedly be best served by a bottom-up approach, which would equal the playing field from the very beginning, giving minorities access to better elementary and high school systems. Also, a focus should be placed on encouraging parents to take a more active role in the ecuation of their children. The real issue is often more a socio-economic one, and resources should be devoted to redressing that disparity.