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This piece ran in the March 4, 1999
issue of the Mount Holyoke News.
AFFIRMING AFFIRMATIVE ACTION
by Joanne Creighton
The recent decision by the University
of Massachusetts at Amherst to change its posture on affirmative
action, softening or diluting its commitment to recruiting and admitting
students of color, comes at a difficult time. Across the nation,
affirmative action is under attack. While we have yet to see the
ramifications of the UMass decision, it is unfortunate that this
decision may well be hailed as a victory by those who seek to dismantle
affirmative action nationwide.
Having scored victories against affirmative action in public education
in California, Washington state, and Texas, conservative forces
are now attacking long-standing affirmative action policies at private
colleges and universities. A public-policy law firm in Washington,
D. C., calling itself the Center for Individual Rights and headed
by Nat Hentoff and former Education Secretary William J. Bennett,
recently launched a campaign which alleges that most colleges employ
race-based admission policies that violate antidiscrimination laws.
Placing ads in student newspapers at 15 prominent campuses across
the nation, this group proclaims that "Nearly Every Elite College
in America Violates the Law." Through these ads and free handbooks
for students and trustees, the Center encourages white students
to sue their college or university for not treating them "fairly,"
and it attempts to intimidate trustees with the threat of litigation
and liability.
The threat of suit is not idle. The campaign was launched to coincide
with the Center's preparation for trial of two civil cases challenging
the admission policies at the University of Washington law school
and the University of Michigan. The Center's strategy is to divide
and conquer institutions committed to diversity goals. Even though
the prevailing Supreme Court ruling, the Bakke case, allows that
race may be one of the factors taken into consideration in making
admissions decisions, with each successive lawsuit, case law chips
away at the concept of affirmative action and contributes to the
growing national unease about policies and practices related to
race in higher education.
This strategy may well succeed unless college and university leaders
speak out for the principles that are at the heart of affirmative
action. Derek Bok and William Bowen, in their data-rich study of
affirmative action, The Shape of the River, have shown how
positive the legacy of affirmative action has been. But clearly
that legacy will not be sustained without our active vigilance and
defense.
Implicitly or explicitly, educational institutions must always consider
not just how and what we teach, but whom we teach and why. We take
"affirmative action" to help identify students of aptitude and promise
from underrepresented groups. Affirmative action is premised on
the theory that educating students from diverse backgrounds will
help to build a more equitable society and that a diversified student
body will enhance the education of all of our students and help
to prepare them to live in a multicultural world.
Colleges and universities must not be intimidated by individuals
and groups who challenge our legal and thoroughly defensible admission
goals and practices. We at Mount Holyoke, like many other institutions,
have set increasing the diversity of the student body as an important
goal. However, we do not have "quotas" for students of color, nor
will a student be admitted simply because she is from an underrepresented
group. Many factors are taken into consideration in deciding whether
to offer admission to any student.
Critics of affirmative action zero in on test scores and argue that
unqualified students of color with lower scores are given places
that "rightly" belong to white students with higher SATs. This argument
assumes incorrectly that test scores alone are the most important
determinant in an admissions decision. But innumerable studies demonstrate
that test scores alone, and even test scores in tandem with academic
performance in high school, are insufficient indicators of potential
for success in college and beyond. The multidimensional evaluation
process which we and many other selective institutions use in admissions
is more work and is messier than doing it "by the numbers," but
we have found such a process to be the best — and fairest —
way to select students. The Center for Individual Rights, however,
seeks to pit students of color against poor white students and to
discourage implementation of affirmative action and similar recruitment
initiatives. If we have well-considered and equitably implemented
policies, we need not be divided by these issues. We can instead
use the current climate as an opportunity for reflection and reaffirmation.
In order to continue to create the best educational environment
for all of our students, we must vigorously defend and reinvigorate
affirmative action.
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