The author reports on a Supreme Court case that is echoing across the University of Texas at Austin, and for some students, it is personal. Not long after the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear Abigail Fisher's case against the University of Texas at Austin, a lighthearted joke made the rounds at the Warfield Center for African and African-American…

The homepage of the Project on Fair Representation (POFR) features a smiling photo of Abigail Fisher, the young White woman at the center of "Fisher v. the University of Texas," which could end race as a criterion in university admissions. Edward Blum, founder of POFR, a conservative advocacy group, connected Fisher with Wiley Rein LLP,…

"The first law of unintended consequences is that you can never know what they will be or how far they will reach." Professor Ellis examines the injuries American higher education has sustained through the unintended consequences of diversity. (Contains 4 footnotes.)

A recent flurry of reporting in mainstream media argues that boys are drowning in a female-centered U.S. education system. According to proponents of the boy crisis argument, boys are just biologically and developmentally different from girls, and it is educators' responsibility to teach to this perceived difference. The U.S. education system,…

The litigant in a historic reverse-discrimination case against the University of Michigan, and subsequently the leader of a Michigan ballot initiative that carried the day against long odds, recounts how her simple call for equal treatment under the law persuaded the people of her state that color-conscious preferences are wrong.

The effort to leave no child behind is a major threat to high-ability students, whose cognitive and affective needs are increasingly falling by the wayside from default, according to gifted education advocates. They argue that the No Child Left Behind Act, with its unprecedented, high-stakes focus on students performing below grade level, leaves…

Describes how, during oral arguments at the U.S. Supreme Court over the University of Michigan's race-conscious admissions policy, several justices indicated that they did not see any viable alternatives to the use of affirmative action in college admissions. (EV)

Public universities in Virginia, as in many states, have generally not paid much attention to diversity among their suppliers. For years, state expenditures for outside contracts went to the usual suspects--White contractors from well-established companies. Four years ago, former Governor Mark Warner, a progressive Democrat from the high…

Reviews hidden assumptions within the concept of reverse discrimination (e.g., racial and gender discrimination is a thing of the past), reviewing what is known about how affirmative action affects Whites. To the extent that affirmative action negatively impacts Whites, the article suggests substituting the more neutral term of "reduced…

Describes how three prominent advocacy organizations are working to find and challenge any college program that serves only members of specific minority groups. (EV)

Research conducted over a 25-year period concerning the needs and problems of African American students at a large, predominantly white university was used to defend a reverse-discrimination lawsuit against that university. The plaintiff claimed that the past effects of discrimination had been ameliorated and that the affirmative active programs…

Describes how several key advocacy groups, working together, have played key roles in bringing the issue of race in college admissions to the Supreme Court. (EV)

A federal judge has affirmed the legality of a scholarship program for black students at the University of Maryland at College Park, based on evidence of present effects of past discrimination provided by the university itself. (MSE)

This book examines the law and politics surrounding the Bakke case ("Regents of the University of California v. Bakke") and discusses the key arguments presented by both sides in the context of the current eroding public support for affirmative action. The goal is to elucidate the dynamics of U.S. Supreme Court decision making and…

The U.S. Supreme Court declined an opportunity last week to rule on the constitutionality of a school district's policy of weighing race as a factor in assigning students to schools. It has sidestepped a potentially thorny sequel to its 2003 rulings on affirmative action in higher education and left several lower-court rulings as the best…