Essay on Affirmative Action in College Admissions

Affirmative action policies are passionately debated by everyone from educators and politicians to ordinary citizens, all who hold differing opinions on both the necessity and validity of the policies. There is no doubt affirmative action is an emotional topic and deals with the

Having done so it would still need to be narrowly tailored so as not to unduly injure any associated groups or individuals. Powell determined that attaining a diverse student body in an institution of higher education was a compelling state interest. In order to be narrowly tailored to this interest, the institution should use race as a "plus" factor. The quota system that the University of California applied set aside positions for minority students and focused on having a diverse statistical surface rather than attaining actual diverse backgrounds. Rather, as was done at Harvard, it was expected that all students should be considered together and race used as a bonus for minorities that would help account for the special perspective such students could bring to the campus (Schauer 589-597). While Powell's outline for programs had plenty of dissenters, none of them ever made it to a prominent position in the court system and so, since 1978, the rules of Bakke have been the proverbial law of the land. That is, until recently.

If institutions of higher education are to keep open minded campuses, they will have to combat beliefs of mismatching so that Affirmative Action(AA) can keep making a difference. Diversifying schools, giving minorities the opportunity of receiving a quality education, and combating stereotypes are three of the many ways AA has been making a difference. Additionally, institutions can advocate for the success AA has had in educating minorities by promoting and advertising fellow AA beneficiaries at their campuses. An example would be the advertisement of Sonia Sotomayor who attended Princeton University thanks to AA. Through AA institutions of higher education are able to alter the social construct of their campuses in order to make the world a more accepting place for change and difference. AA is currently being viewed by some as a negative force for minority youth applying to colleges due to

The equal opportunity that affirmative action provides has also increased the amount of minority applicants applying to each school. It has “resulted in doubling or tripling the number of minority applications to colleges or universities, and have made colleges and universities more representative of their surrounding community” (Messerli). Since the playing field has been evened, it has encouraged more of those who are disadvantaged because of their ethnicity to apply for and get admitted into college. However, the quotas cause schools to admit under qualified students of minor races who don’t meet the limit over highly qualified students who’s race has reached the limit.

Affirmative action was created to help end discrimination in the work place and in educational opportunities, but has given an unfair advantage to minority groups at the expense of more qualified individuals. Because employers and colleges must show that they are accepting a proportional amount of minorities in their application acceptance process, highly qualified

After the Civil Rights Act passed in 1964, affirmative action practices were incorporated into the college admissions process, with the objective of ending institutional discrimination based on race, creed, color or national origin. In the decades since, several court cases have refined the way that colleges and universities can address racial inequality in college admissions. Although the Supreme Court has generally supported diversity as a governmental and public interest, what that actually means in terms of incorporating diversity into the admissions process continues to be debated on at the highest level of government, on college campuses and in the courts. Many selective

Affirmative action has been one of the most effective tools to correct a history of inequalities in our nation’s history against people of color and women. The huge advances made during Civil Rights era still has not completely eradicated centuries of sexism and racism. Opportunities for advancement for those previously omitted remain few and far between in comparison to their counterparts. Race and gender are not, nor should they be, the only selection measure but they do warrant to be one of the many influences considered in college admissions, hiring, and awarding of grants and other forms of financial aid. Many prestigious and well regarded school universities such as Harvard and Stanford have been at the forefront of this ideal. Nonetheless, affirmative action remains a heavily contested social issue in the United States.

Affirmative Action is a policy aimed to improving educational and employment opportunities for African Americans, women and other minorities. Affirmative Action is significant because it has been effective for allowing the underrepresented to obtain career and educational goals. Many African Americans were admitted into predominately white schools and careers due to Affirmative Action. Affirmative action programs play a critically important role in the black experience in America because they originated as techniques designed to promote equality for blacks after equal opportunity techniques alone proved inadequate to secure equality for blacks. The use of these programs led to more black presence or representation in some national institutions,

It is quite common to see people in all races study in the same classrooms nowadays, but back to history this kind of classroom was nearly impossible to exist. The reason behind this huge transformation is because of affirmative action. Although there is a heated debate on whether college admission should only be based on students’ merits or minority races. be racial conscious. This debatable topic leads to a question that affirmative action should be banned or not. Affirmative action is necessary during the college admission process, because affirmative action is beneficial for the colleges to become more cultural and racial diverse and minorities can gain greater power in the society and promoting the equality for minorities.

In today’s society there are many issues involving racial inequality. One major issue affecting college students and high school seniors is affirmative action. Affirmative action is a policy favoring those who tend to suffer from discrimination, especially minorities. Affirmative action started in the 1970’s and its purpose is to help universities better diversify their campus with different demographics. At the time, affirmative action was a means of restitution for human rights abuse African Americans suffered for generations. Today, affirmative action is not limited to blacks, and is a controversial issue due to higher competition with college acceptance rates.

Statistics have proven that when affirmative action is eliminated, such as when it was at Berkley College and UCLA in 1998, the minority student admissions fell 61 percent and 36 percent respectively, proving that affirmative action plays a major role in a minority students college admissions process. Affirmative action supporters also believe that diversity in higher education provides a better educational atmosphere for all students, personally and intellectually. If affirmative action were to be eliminated, there would be fewer minority students enrolled in colleges, causing diversity to be fairly slim. Affirmative action policies are also necessary in order to compensate for centuries of racial, economic, and social oppression. Individuals with a

In 1998, when California banned its affirmative actions program, it had a huge impact in the number of minority admissions at UC Berkeley and UCLA, dropping the number of admissions to 61 percent and 36 percent respectively. It was the same case in Texas at Rice University, when the program was eliminated the number of students reduced to 46 percent less African-Americans and 22 percent less Hispanics students (NCSL, 2014). This shows that the program benefitted a lots of minority students to getting admissions, get education and graduate helping them get better job opportunities, and eventually better

     Affirmative action is a social policy created to promote the welfare of minorities by supporting the idea that individuals are all created equal and should not be judged by race or gender. Therefore, in situations like job and university applications, we should consider minorities to be as feasible a choice for hire as a white male candidate, taking into consideration their background. In short, it tries to give minorities that have been at a disadvantage their whole life, an opportunity to ‘equal the playing field’ by providing a broader context by which to measure an applicant or prospective employee. In the end, however, this goal is not realized. Instead, superficial ‘quotas’ are established and the

Over the years, colleges and universities have been making efforts to amend discrimination by targeted admissions, financial aid programs, and other efforts assisting minority students (Gardner, 2006). But the debate over diversity characteristics (including race and ethnicity) in the admission process will never come to an end. The affirmative action in several states has raised discussions about minority access to higher education focusing on the

Affirmative Action should not be used in college because it sets up students for failure. A quote from the article “Race Matters” by Adam Liptak reads, “The idea that she might be discriminated against and not be admitted because of her race is incredible to me,” (Liptak). Hans von Spakovsky (Spakovsky is a legal fellow at the Heritage Foundation), is horrified by the discrimination occurring in colleges. Her own daughter applied to a college, and was later rejected because of her race. This is a form of discrimination and being prejudice. The college did not care about Spakovsky daughter’s grades, or who she was as a person/student. The college only cared about her race, where she came from, and who her family was. This is discrimination that