Non-Affirmative End To Advantages For Universities, Too

I have just finished reading a progress report about the pullback in affirmative action programs at the University of Texas and its public counterpart in California. Arguably, these are two of America’s most prized academic institutions.

I wouldn’t say California and Texas were predestined for disaster because of their controversial action last year to dismantle race-based scholarships. But the way things have been going since last year for both schools - and, indeed, for other schools contemplating similar anti-affirmative action efforts - they might want to think twice about the consequences that could ensue.

Talk about coming out on the short end of the higher education stick. Not only have California and Texas been experiencing a sharp drop in minority enrollment, but the precipitous decline in this important area should serve as an eerie blueprint for public relations disasters that both taxpayer-supported institutions can do without.

A recent New York Times account of the academic quagmire showed black applications for admission off about 26 percent at Texas, with about a 23 percent drop for Hispanics. California’s minority admission figures are a little lower - but still substantially off.

To make matters worse, the number of overall applicants in Texas is off about 13 percent.

Granted, a record number of students have applied for admission to the California state university system. But the 8.2 percent decline in black applications, coupled with a 3.7 percent downward spiral for Hispanics and 9 percent for American Indians, took the steam out of the overall rise in admissions.

The University of Texas Law School, along with the medical school at California, took the biggest hit in minority applications, with Texas experiencing a mind-blowing 42 percent decline - and California plummeting about 23 percent.

It was at the UT Law School where the affirmative action fight has intensified the past year. It was there that several white students filed a lawsuit to block any additional preferential treatment for minorities in law school admissions.

Naturally, the fallout from all of this is not pretty, especially when you see the kind of negative impact it has had on the minority presence on the campuses. Diverse enrollment is a prerequisite for the success of a major school - and properly so.

While the long-term repercussions for ending controversial preferential or set-aside scholarship programs at California and Texas could be even more devastating down the road, no one wants to see any college or university tainted, much less two class-A institutions, because of growing political pressure to jettison longstanding, proven, opportunity-based programs.

That must be uppermost in the minds of California and Texas university officials today, where curtailment of race-based scholarships is clearly yielding the opposite results - all in the face of a politically charged environment in two of this country’s most populist states to wipe out hard-fought racial progress made over the years.

But at least one University of California regent is pooh-poohing the low minority enrollment figures at his school, preferring to chalk the whole thing up to routine program adjustments, which he says will help reverse unfair admission standards.

“This is just basic logic,” Ward Connerly told the Times. “If you’ve been given a substantial preference based on race and you take it away, the numbers are going to drop. But just because you’re not going to get a preference doesn’t mean you’re not welcome.”

Fortunately, Connerly’s views about the declining admission figures for minority applicants are not widely shared. At least not from this corner. And they shouldn’t be. Otherwise, there would be no reason on the part of anyone, least of all Connerly, to bring about a requisite fix.

Diversity, whether in academics or capitalism, is still good business.

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The following fields overflowed: CREDIT = Fred Davis, Washington State University