Universities Weblog

Visit any top-tier college in America and you'll see plenty of Asian students walking around campus. Some people think there should be more.

Nationally, Asian students, as a group, score best on the SAT and many have excellent grades to boot. If a prestigious university like, say, Stanford admitted students based solely on these measures, Asians would probably constitute the majority. Of course, colleges always take other factors into consideration. But the point is simple: Many high-achieving Asian students don't gain admission to top colleges because institutions fear the loss of diversity—that is, too many Asians. Do colleges operate under a quota? No, because quotas have been ruled unconstitutional by the Supreme Court. Limits are imposed more subtly.

At the same time, Black and Hispanic students benefit from affirmative action, enabling many students with lower grades and test scores to gain admission to top schools. (Asians typically aren't considered a protected class that affirmative action should benefit.) Again, no quotas dictate strict numbers or percentages, but "favoritism" nevertheless occurs. Yet you'd find that many Asians are indeed disadvantaged; they come from poor, working-class families who struggle just as mightily as many Black and Hispanic families. Some of these kids grow up overcoming the burden of learning English as a second language. So why shouldn't they receive the extra "bump" that affirmative action provides?

Because affirmative action is race-based, not class-based. A similar argument can be made for Black and Hispanic students from affluent families. Do they deserve preferential treatment in the admissions process if they've been privileged all along?

What do you think?

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