Affirmative action proponents still face uphill battle

  Michael Weiner Weiner is a Daily Bruin
columnist who analyzes issues relating to the UCLA and UC
community.

The UC Board of Regents’ unanimous decision to rescind its
1995 ban on affirmative action last month has been viewed by
activists as a substantial victory in the battle to bring racial
preferences back to the University of California.

That optimism, however, may be seriously misguided in our
present political climate.

While the symbolic significance of the regents’ action
should not be discounted, the future of affirmative action remains
tenuous at best. Advocates of diversity must think long and hard
about real alternatives to affirmative action.

Proposition 209, the 1996 ballot measure that outlawed
affirmative action in California, remains the law, and continues to
prevent university officials from instituting admissions and hiring
policies that could take race and gender into account. Furthermore,
it is doubtful this state’s electorate, which is much whiter,
older and more conservative than the actual California population,
would be willing to change its mind on 209 any time soon.

Even so, state politics and university policy may not be the
biggest hurdles for the pro-affirmative action movement. Sooner
rather than later, affirmative action again will be considered by
the U.S. Supreme Court. With George W. Bush in the White House and
the right wing chomping at the bit for his first high court
nominees, preference programs nationwide may be doomed.

Many of the justices are getting old, including Ruth Bader
Ginsburg and John Paul Stevens, both of whom have reliably defended
affirmative action. During his campaign for the presidency, Bush
cited justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas as his ideal
judicial models. Both have indicated they will strike down
affirmative action completely given the opportunity.

In the last major case dealing with the subject, 1995’s
Adarand Constructors v. Pena, the court severely curtailed federal
workplace affirmative action programs, but didn’t bar them
entirely. Nonetheless, in concurrent opinions, Scalia and Thomas
expressed distaste for such programs across the board.

Despite the recent Democratic takeover of the U.S. Senate
““ which must confirm all judicial nominees ““
progressives may be unable to prevent Bush from appointing
right-wing justices like Scalia and Thomas to the Supreme Court.
This is evidenced by the failure of Senate Democrats to muster
enough votes to prevent the appointment of Ted Olson, a prominent
conservative lawyer who has argued against affirmative action
before the Supreme Court, as Bush’s solicitor general.

If that’s the case, it may only be a matter of time before
affirmative action is relegated to the dustbin of history.

With contradictory decisions at the district and appellate
levels, it looks increasingly likely that the Supreme Court will
consider the legality of affirmative action in higher education in
the not-too-distant future. Whether that happens before Bush makes
an appointment ““ and whether such an appointment would have
an effect on the decision ““ remains unclear. What is evident
is that if such a decision were made today, the vote would be very
close. And it could go either way.

All this should serve notice to affirmative action backers:
It’s time to think about real alternatives to racial
preferences. Diversity in our institutions of higher education is
an unquantifiable good; a proactive and creative approach must be
taken to ensure its preservation.

Not surprisingly, the University of California is on the cutting
edge of this problem because it was one of the first major public
universities to ban affirmative action. The strategy for
maintaining diversity that the UC has followed over the last six
years is instructive in considering America’s capacity to
ensure access to higher education without racial preferences.

Unfortunately, for most of that time, UC policies aimed more
toward generating good P.R. than to actually promoting
diversity.

The regents began by placing outreach at the center of their
strategy. Funding increased significantly for systemwide and
campus-based programs aimed at increasing disadvantaged K-12
students’ preparedness for a college education. Such programs
include mentoring by UC students, recruitment centers and teacher
training for inner-city schools.

All these things represent an important aspect of the UC’s
mission, namely, public service. But it is wrong to think the
university can singlehandedly make a significant impact on the
racial and socioeconomic inequality that characterize K-12 public
education in this state. And of course, it hasn’t.

Perhaps implicitly recognizing this fact, the university, led by
President Richard Atkinson ““ himself a supporter of
affirmative action ““ began ever so gingerly to tinker with
admissions policies the last three years.

First came the 4 percent plan. Heralded by Gov. Gray Davis, the
plan guarantees admission to a UC campus to all students who
graduate in the top 4 percent of their high school class. The idea
is that students who are relatively successful in poorly performing
schools deserve a shot at the big time. But because it is not
campus-specific, the plan, which was applied for the first time to
next fall’s entering class, is unlikely to increase diversity
at the highly-selective flagship campuses of UCLA and UC
Berkeley.

Next, Atkinson proposed a complicated “dual
admissions” program, by which students in the top 4 through
12.5 percent of their high school class would be guaranteed UC
admission after completing two years of community college. Again,
the plan is not campus-specific and worse, it creates an internal
caste system, in which some students are considered worthy of a
full four (or five) year UC education and others aren’t.

Atkinson finally moved beyond P.R. with his bold proposal to
drop the SAT I as a requirement in undergraduate admissions.
Recognizing the negative impact high-risk standardized tests exact
on all students, the UC president jumpstarted a debate that will
have profound national implications.

If the regents and the Academic Senate grant approval, it will
be the most significant policy change in the post-affirmative
action era. That is because African American and Latino students
tend to do worse on the exam than their white and Asian American
counterparts. Scrapping the SAT could markedly improve the
UC’s accessibility to students of all races and socioeconomic
groups.

The future will require more bold reforms if this university is
to retain its commitment to diversity. Eventually, that will mean
an overhaul of the admissions system to allow for a more holistic
approach that judges all students in their entirety, not as
products of a formula of misleading numbers. It also means that
until advanced placement classes are equally available throughout
the state, such exams must be deemphasized in the admissions
process.

The era of affirmative action may be coming to an end, but the
era of access need not follow. The UC, both with its good and bad
ideas, serves as an example for universities across the country.
Its success in rising to the challenge could not be more
important.