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Rights Panel Backs Affirmative Action
By Hans P. Johnson
The U.S. Commission on Civil Rights issued a statement in April criticizing efforts to replace affirmative action in higher education with admissions plans that guarantee entrance to a percentage of top-ranked graduates from all high schools in a state.
"Affirmative action works better than anything else we've tried," Mary Frances Berry, professor of history at the University of Pennsylvania and chair of the commission, told Academe. "Institutions that have it ought to keep it. In those places where it is no longer an option, I commend those who are trying to maintain or promote diversity. We need to make sure that the programs they draw up maximize the accessibility of higher education."
"Race-conscious affirmative action has not brought nearly enough black and Latino students into undergraduate, graduate, or professional higher education programs," the commission's statement read. "The percentage plans will do no better and probably worse. . . . The major problem with the percentage plans is their inattention to law schools, medical schools, and other graduate and professional schools, where ending affirmative action is devastating."
Florida governor Jeb Bush has proposed to end current affirmative action programs in public higher education and, in their place, implement a plan that would automatically grant admission to a state college or university to the top 20 percent of graduating seniors from all state high schools. The NAACP has filed a complaint to block the governor's proposal; a decision is awaited. In California a similar plan affecting the top 4 percent of high school graduates will take effect next year, and Texas has a policy that grants college admission to the top 10 percent of seniors. Berry praised the Texas plan for at least guaranteeing access to the state's premier public campuses, whereas California and Florida offer only a spot at any one of a number of public institutions.
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