Affirmative Action - "Preferences"
Earl Maltz
emaltz at camden.rutgers.edu
Mon Nov 20 06:44:36 PST 2006
What about Wayne State (a very good public law school)?
At 04:06 PM 11/18/2006 -0800, Lynne Henderson wrote:
>Finally, we get back to the zero-sum game problem. Ms. Gratz was not
>denied a college education, she was denied at the "prestigious"
>school. Many, many people go on to great success from "lesser" colleges,
>as I tried to point out a while ago. (Ms. Grutter may have had a stronger
>claim since at the time, Michigan had only one public law school, but now
>it has two)
>
>Respectfully,
>Lynne Henderson
>
>
>On Nov 18, 2006, at 3:07 PM, DavidEBernstein at aol.com wrote:
>
>
>>One thing one should insist on in the affirmative action debate is some
>>forthrightness about what's going on. Personally, I think the fact that
>>the statistical gap among groups' performance on various entrance exams
>>actually lends support to preferences for the groups that do worse,
>>because, at least in the short-term, there really is no practical
>>alternative if one wants to include a reasonable representation of all
>>racial groups in the classes of elite schools, other than abolishing
>>traditional admission criteria (which may or may not be a good idea, but
>>is in many ways a more extreme solution).
>
>>
>
>>Nevertheless, various university (including) law school officials seem to
>>feel the need to deny that preferences exist in any meaningful fashion (I
>>can cite examples, but I don't think this point is controversial), that
>>at most they are simply choosing between candidates who are more or less
>>equally qualified.
>
>>
>
>>Here are some actual stats, for law schools.
>
>>
>
>>This is from the American Lawyer, circa the debate over Proposition 209:
>
>>
>
>>-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>
>>Total law school applicants nationally in 1996-97 with:
>
>>Black Hispanic White
>
>>LSAT of 160 (83.5 percentile) and GPA of 3.25 (a low B+ 103 224 7,715
>
>>average)
>
>>LSAT of 164 (92.3 percentile) and GPA of 3.50 (B+/A- 16 45 2,646
>
>>average)
>
>>Average for all applicants receiving offers from Boalt for '97:
>
>>LSAT of 169 (97.7 percentile) and 3.74 GPA (high A- average)
>
>>Minority enrollment at for the entering class of '97:
>
>
>> Black Hispanic
>
>>Harvard Law School 49 24
>
>>Stanford Law School 12 19
>
>>Yale Law School 18 15
>
>>
>
>>At Boalt the same year
>
>>LSAT (percentile) GPA
>
>
>>Nonminorities 168 (96.9) 3.72
>
>>Asian 166 (95.0) 3.71
>
>>Hispanic 159 (80.5) 3.50
>
>>Black 155 (67.0) 3.54
>
>>
>
>>The point of the American Lawyer article, which was very supportive of
>>AA, is to show that if Boalt wanted to matriculate African American and
>>(to a lesser degree) Hispanic students, it had no choice but to either
>>(a) abolish traditional admissions criteria; or (b) use
>>preferences. It's hard to argue with that conclusion.
>
>>
>
>>
>
>> From the lower court's Grutter opinion:
>
>>
>
>>In the 1994 entering class (at U. Mich. Law School), white students had a
>>median LSAT score of 168 and a median UGPA of 3.57, while the
>>corresponding figures were 157 and 2.97 for African American students,
>>and 162 and 3.26 for Mexican American students. In the 1995 entering
>>class, white students had a median LSAT score of 167 and a median UGPA of
>>3.59, while the corresponding figures were 155 and 3.18 for African
>>American students, and 159 and 3.35 for Mexican American students.
>
>>
>
>>Now, anyone who looks at these statistics rationally recognizes that
>>having certain types of minority status is a huge advantage in law school
>>admissions, and the same is true for undergraduate admissions at elite
>>colleges. And if certain groups have an advantage, the necessary
>>corollary is that other groups are at a disadvantage.
>
>>
>
>>That doesn't mean that the policies are unjustified. Indeed, as I
>>mentioned, the yawning gap in test scores actually makes me more
>>sympathetic to such policies. (Though, as I've written, I become very
>>concerned when the desire for diversity in law schools leads to policies
>>that encourage the matriculation at lower ranked law schools of students
>>who, unbenownest to them, statistically have a poor chance of ever
>>passing the bar). But one reason that the proponents of AA haven't made
>>as much headway as they might with public opinion is that instead of
>>universities being forthright about what they do and why, they resort to
>>various forms of subterfuge (e.g., claiming they are most concerned with
>>"diversity" because of the important of diverse perspectives in the
>>classroom, while having liberal arts faculties whose political views
>>range from left to far left), admittedly partly a result of the
>>restrictions that Bakke put on the legally permissible justifications for
>>preferences.
>
>>
>
>>But as academics, we can and should acknowledge the reality of the
>>situation, and start from there. Gratz may or may not have been admitted
>>to U. Mich. in the absence of preferences, but, if the claim is that
>>one's race shouldn't be a factor in admissions, I don't see how that's
>>either here nor there.
>
>>
>
>>David Bernstein
>
>>Visiting Professor
>
>>Brooklyn Law School
>
>>Professor
>
>>George Mason University
>
>>School of Law
>
>>
>
>>In a message dated 11/18/2006 5:34:45 PM Eastern Standard Time,
>>Mark.Scarberry at pepperdine.edu writes:
>
>>
>>>Unless I'm mistaken, the Supreme Court did find that the Univ. of
>>>Michigan's undergraduate affirmative action admissions program violated
>>>Gratz's 14th Am. right to equal protection. Curiously, the Post story
>>>omits that point and leaves the reader with the contrary impression.
>>
>>>
>>
>>>Mark S. Scarberry
>>
>>>Pepperdine Univ. School of Law
>>
>>
>>>From: conlawprof-bounces at lists.ucla.edu on behalf of Steven Jamar
>>
>>>Sent: Sat 11/18/2006 1:48 PM
>>
>>>To: conlawprof at lists.ucla.edu
>>
>>>Subject: Affirmative Action - Washington Post Article
>>
>>
>>>I found this interesting, especially the numbers relating to actual
>>>admits of whites and Asians compared to Gratz.:
>>>
>>>>To back the contention that Gratz did not suffer because of race, the
>>>>university points out that 1,400 white and Asian students with lower
>>>>grades or test scores than hers were admitted that year, while 2,000
>>>>whites and Asians with higher test scores were denied admission.
>>><http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/11/17/AR2006111701640.html>http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/11/17/AR2006111701640.html
>>>
>>>_______________________________________________
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