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Minority Student's Arguments Against Affirmative Action

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Those who are against Affirmative Action do not argue against the values for which its proponents stand; in actuality, members of all sides of the academic spectrum hold the same values to be true. The argument at hand is not with the values, but with the methods and potential negative results of Affirmative Action. It had been suggested that colleges which institute Affirmative Action implement their admissions systems so that minority students are more likely to be accepted that non-minority students. In his model, Professor Qiang Fu demonstrates that college systems are designed to “favor the minority [student] and allow the admissions not to be awarded to the [non-minority] [student]” (Fu 424). Potentially, this can be viewed as a form …show more content…

With knowledge about America’s extensive history of racial tensions, discrimination, and segregation, however, this appears to be an appropriate method of academic assistance and equality in regards to college admissions. The nationwide affirmative action program based on race appears to be a fair and reliable method of college admittance; however, there remain slight discrepancies, like a potential for reverse discrimination, which cannot be ignored. Proponents on all sides of the academic spectrum agree that using a different criteria for college admissions, socioeconomic status, could prove to be the better option in keeping with the promotion of diversity while establishing reasonable boundaries for the number of admitted students (“Socioeconomic Status” 79). Similarly to how Affirmative Action in college admissions currently gives advantage to students of ethnic minority, affirmative action will begin to give advantage to students who live in families of low socioeconomic status. Additionally, this new criteria will serve the core values of promoting diversity, equal opportunity, fairness, and the elimination of discrimination in college admissions. The majority of students who are currently assisted by racially-driven affirmative action programs will continue to be serviced under the standard of socioeconomic status. Texas State University professor Bryan Nankervis states that the majority of minority groups are already in the bottom two-thirds percentile of the Unites States, when taking into consideration yearly salary; therefore, the minority groups in the United States which would be assisted by race-based Affirmative Action according to current criteria would also be helped by economic-based Affirmative Action (7). The goal behind socioeconomic status-based admissions (SES) is to utilize the established “correlation between race and income in order to construct a racially diverse class of

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In “Net (Race) Neutral: An Essay on How GPA + (reweighted) SAT - Race = Diversity,” Christine Goodman illustrates the opposing viewpoints in regards to the racial discriminatory efforts by the college institutions to help diversify the incoming freshman class. With this, Goodman provides statistics and opinions of experts on the matter, which includes comparison of such discriminatory acts against other institutions. To begin, she brings up an enlightening, yet controversial court case decision: Fisher v. University of Texas at Austin (2013). This court case demonstrates significance to this topic because it counteracts a previous court case, Grutter v. Bollinger (2003), which, “upheld diversity as a compelling interest that would justify narrowly

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This standard requires universities to demonstrate that the inclusion of race furthers a compelling governmental interest, and is narrowly tailored to achieve that interest. Of particular importance to the Court is whether “the means chosen ‘fit’ th[e] compelling goal so closely that there is little or no possibility that the motive for the classification was illegitimate racial prejudice or stereotype.” Put differently, universities must demonstrate that including race in the admissions process is necessary to enroll a diverse student body, and is accomplished through means that are reasonably calculated to achieve the educational benefits of

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Is affirmative action still necessary for guaranteeing equal access to educational opportunities at elite universities and graduate schools? Should admissions decisions be based solely on academic criteria and merit? Key Words: affirmative action, Grutter V. Bollinger, and diversity. Grutter V. Bollinger Research Paper 3 Affirmative Action in Education Affirmative action was formed more than fifty years ago.

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In the article, “The Truth about ‘holistic College Admissions”, Sara Harberson expresses how universities that are not allowed to use racial preferences on college admissions, are still devising strategies to work around the laws to produce the same result. Harberson states how the institutions are using what is called “holistic admissions”, which allows a college to factor in a student's background, race and income. By filtering out the minority groups, they are creating a less-diverse community, preventing students of certain backgrounds from a proper education, and taking away opportunities from students based on their ethnicity. Colleges are using racial segregation in the admission process so that they can have a white-favoring campus

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Affirmative action policies promote diversity in public spaces, which will prepare students for future after graduation. This is essential because the world has become rapidly diverse, especially in the United States. Furthermore, affirmative action provides an environment for minority students in which they can have more chances to overcome their handicaps and to compete equally. From many aspects, minorities still have many obstacles to excel in this society, especially due to their socioeconomic status. Proponents of affirmative action programs assert that non-minority students blame their failure on this policy.

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In his article “Affirmative Action in Higher Education: Is It Necessary?” , Rodney Reed debates the necessity of affirmative action as a critical measure in the fight against discrimination in higher education. In order to stress this conviction, he does not eschew the usage of strongly biased diction and argument. Firstly, on page 333 Reed states that “in [his] view, affirmative action is a series of positive steps” and that “[his] concern is with Blacks, Hispanics, and Native Americans”, where he does not conceal that this is his perspective and not necessarily the truth.

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In 1995, the number of black college students was less than 5%. By 1990 over 11% of college students were black. This jump in percentage is thanks to the role of affirmative action. According to Casey Quinlan, in her article, “Why We Still Need Affirmative Action Policies in College Admissions”, there are two kinds of affirmative action approaches used in college and university admissions. The soft approach is when colleges and universities use outreach programs to attract a diverse population of students.

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“Affirmative Action may not be a perfect system, but there should be no doubt that it has endangered many successes. It has opened the doors of America’s most elite educational institutions to minority students, granting them unprecedented opportunities” (Ogletree 12). Thanks to Presidents John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson a policy that prohibits employment and education discrimination based on race, color, religion, national origin, and sex is offered today to those who suffer from said discriminations (A Brief History). Affirmative action has opened abundant openings for minorities, allowing the cycle of going to college to be passed down generations and provided job opportunities that otherwise would not be considered by most. Affirmative

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The main precedent that has stuck with the court from Bakke to now Fisher is that a diverse student body is a compelling enough interest for a university to pursue. This goal is to be carried out in a narrowly tailored manner which the court has accepted as a race-conscious admissions program. The program is deemed constitutional on the basis that it only uses race as a plus factor in the admissions process. These programs, however, run in stark contrast to the provisions set forth in the Equal Protection Clause; in which the state is not allowed to treat individuals differently based on the category of race. The race-conscious admissions program albeit better than a pure quota system still uses race as a crucial factor.

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Affirmative action is one of the obvious reasons why colleges consider race or ethnicity when making admissions decisions. Another reason is because a student’s college experience is enhanced through interactions with other students that come from different social, cultural and economic backgrounds. It also can help prepare students for their professor careers and life outside of school. But there is also a concern that colleges basing admissions on race may be passing up equally or more talented students for the sake of reaching a goal.

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Opponents of affirmative action repeatedly mention that is easier for participants of some individuals to get into an institution and difficult for others. Nevertheless, the persistence of affirmative action is to raise the admissions rates of minorities that are under-represented in the U.S institutions. This under-representation is recognized to several public reasons such as a) Students who are from families or relatives where only few individuals have followed an advanced schooling are less expected to surpass in high school. b) Kids who come from groups where English is not often spoken face a great difficulty in writing and reading. c) Lastly, students from school neighborhoods with a low funding, are incline to participate poorly on

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In this question there were very real negative implications associated with affirmative action. The very word that is chosen to be the opposing choice to affirmative programs,“merit”, is itself synonymous with deserving. The word choice in this poll implies that those who benefit from affirmative action lack in merit and deserving. It is further stated that it is likely minority students who benefit from these programs may not have gotten in on their own, further driving home the suggestion that minority students are not deserving in the first place. Again, the wording of the poll does affect the response that polls will receive.

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The fear is that without this policy, diversity will not always happen if left up to chance. It is true that schools and other organizations have discriminated against women and people of other race. This problem created an unfair advantage for males of the superior race. Supporters also charge that without affirmative action African Americans would have a more difficult process of being admitted into prestigious and predominately white universities (Hopkins, 2010). Affirmative Action allows minorities to reflect different areas of study and work that otherwise would have never been considered.

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According to the dominant theory the affirmative action was firstly introduced to deal with two types of social disruption in the 1960s as campus protests and urban riots in the North. However, this article is based on different theory as dominant theory's empirical evidence is limited. It examines the initial reason for advent of race-conscious affirmative action in 17 undergraduate institutions in the United States. And according to the research this article concludes that there were two waves that contributed to affirmative action: 1) first wave in the early 1960s introduced by northern college administrators 2) second wave in the late 1960s introduced as a response to the protests of campus-based students. This article will help me to establish the main reasons for introduction of race-conscious affirmative action in undergraduate

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They argue that affirmative action is detrimental to their group in that this programs “reinforces the perceptions that minority groups are inferior” and require assistance to help level them onto the same playing field as the majority (Maio and Esses, 1998, p65). There has been encounters on university campuses where minority groups are disqualified through statements that says they only got accepted because of affirmative action programs and not their merits. This leads to another part of their argument about implementing affirmative action programs because the society values the achievement ideology where you pull yourself up by your bootstraps without any assistance. The achievement ideology can be argued to support color-blind racism because it is believed that everyone has an equal opportunity to get to the same position if they work hard. Yet, there are still more factors than just hard work that contributes to success.

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