Despite having an optimistic edge, the issue of affirmative action has again come under fire by individuals who claim the strategy is hurting minorities more than helping.
In a study done by Washington-based Cato Institute, lead researcher Marie Gryphon found universities that racially preference admissions are not helping minority students.
“The reason that affirmative action does not affect college access is that most four-year colleges and universities in America are not selective; they take anyone with a standard high school education,” Gryphon’s study said.
However, the study said the reason minority students do not receive as many degrees as white students is because minority students only meet the minimum credentials.
“Freshmen must be ‘college ready’ at almost all four-year colleges,” the study said.
In effect, Gryphon claimed poor admissions standards resulted in poor academic standards and caused minority students to receive low grades.
“African-American college students earn grade point averages about two-thirds of a letter grade below their non-minority peers,” Gryphon said in the study. “They are far more likely to drop out, and those who graduate finish, on average, in the bottom 25 percent of their college class.”
Still, Gryphon is not alone in her beliefs. Last November, University of California-Los Angeles law professor Richard Sander submitted a study to the Stanford Law Review that suggested black students are more likely to receive worse grades, drop out or fail the bar exam due to affirmative action.
In response to Sander’s study, May’s Stanford Law Review will host several authors who contest Sander’s study on various levels as well as another posting by Sander himself.
Many have hailed the question of whether affirmative action hurts or helps students of color as the next great argument in the affirmative-action debate.
“The effectiveness of racial preferences is absolutely the next battleground for this issue,” Gryphon said in an e-mail. “Now that it is clear the courts will allow preferential policies, it is important to take a long look at whether they achieve their intended goals.”
University of Wisconsin professor emeritus of law Gordon Baldwin said many statistics are fairly good, but they should be looked at with a jaundiced eye.
“There are costs [to affirmative action] — there is no question about [that],” Baldwin said. “The advantage is those who have done particularly well.”
However, UW Provost Peter Spear disagreed with Gryphon’s claims and said he did not believe this was the “next battleground” of the affirmative-action debate since these comments and criticisms were not new.
Spear argued numeric claims, like those made by Gryphon and Sander, were only based on numerical qualifications. He said the claims disregarded many nonacademic characteristics of students that were chosen.
“If you look at studies which predict success, they only predict a relatively small portion of success,” Spear said. “There’re a lot of other factors that can predict success.”
Spear also commented on critics of affirmative action who suggested it could deteriorate the self-esteem of some students.
“I can tell you that every student we admit to this university has the ability to succeed here,” Spear said. “I guarantee you none of the students [at UW] are admitted without our believing their qualification as defined by all of these characteristics are such that they have the ability to succeed.”
