University of Washington Reverse Discrimination
Suit: Update**
Some Public Colleges CAN
Consider Applicants' Race (12/05/00)
Synopsis: California
and Washington state are exempt from a court ruling that public colleges can use racial
preferences in determining student admissions.
California and Washington state's anti-preferences laws trump the Court's ruling, but
seven other western states in the 9th U.S. Circuit must abide by the court's decision:
Alaska, Arizona, Idaho, Hawaii, Montana, Nevada, and Oregon.
A three judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals (based in San Francisco) issued the
ruling Dec. 4, 2000 stating that public colleges are free to use race and ethnicity to
deny white students entrance in order to promote "diversity".
See UPDATE:
 |
The opinion was prompted by a 1997 federal lawsuit against the University of Washington's
racially biased admissions policies. The plaintiffs were three white applicants who
were denied admission in favor of lower-scoring minorities. |
The Chronicle writes: "The ruling by a three-judge panel led by one of the
court's most conservative judges, Ferdinand Fernandez, was welcome news for affirmative
action advocates after a crushing defeat in the California Supreme Court.
"[The California Supreme Court] ruled unanimously last week that Prop. 209, the 1996
initiative outlawing race and gender preferences in state and local government, prohibits
recruitment programs that selectively distribute information to minorities and women even
if they were not given an advantage in bidding. The ruling in a San Jose case could
invalidate scores of local programs, including a San Francisco contracting ordinance.
"Yesterday's federal court ruling "sends a very important message that there is
still room for race- and gender-conscious remedies under the federal Constitution, barring
a local 209-type law," said American Civil Liberties Union lawyer Edward Chen.
"The Clinton administration's Justice Department and several educational
organizations filed arguments supporting the view that the court ultimately took.
"Attorney Michael E. Rossman of the Center for Individual Rights, a conservative
organization based in Washington, D.C., that filed the federal suit, said the issue is
ripe for U.S. Supreme Court review because the ruling created a split among appeals
courts. "We think there is far too much consideration of race in the admission
process," he said."
(Excerpted from the story by Bob Egelko in
the 12/5/00 San Francisco Chronicle.)
Last Known Link:
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2000/12/05/MN35352.DTL
For additional news and background
clips about the University of Washington case, see also: http://www.adversity.net/cirnews.htm#umich
Washington (Seattle):
UW's scholarship plan adapts to
Initiative 200 (04/17/99)
"The University of Washington has adopted a new policy on scholarships that will
allow it to use race and gender to give out targeted scholarships and to accept money from
donors for such programs. The Board of Regents unanimously approved the policy yesterday.
It is meant to comply with Initiative 200, which banned the use of race preferences in
state hiring, contracting and education.
"The new policy will keep all existing scholarships that target students by gender,
ethnicity, race and national origin. But it will also review them for compliance with
state and federal law and the UW policy.
"The UW will keep accepting money for [racially] targeted scholarships from donors.
But it will create "diversity pools" of candidates selected on merit and other
neutral factors such as economic need, but not race or gender. Then it will match
qualified recipients in those pools by the donor's wishes, which could include race or
gender. If no qualified students match the criteria, no scholarship will be given out.
"The new policy will even allow the university to use race and gender and other
diversity indicators to give out scholarships meant to increase diversity, including funds
to recruit students. It may do so only after it exhausts all other means to maintain or
increase diversity at the campus." (Seattle Times 04/17/99 by Roberto Sanchez)
Last Known Link:
http://www.seattletimes.com/news/education/html98/rege_19990417.html
Washington (Seattle):
UW regents clarify minority scholarship
policy (03/19/99)
"How to award scholarships to minorities without violating Initiative 200 has been
hotly debated at the University of Washington. Today, the UW Board of Regents will
discuss a second try at forming a scholarship policy. The rewrite would better accommodate
privately funded scholarships that donors want awarded based on race or gender.
"I-200, which Washington voters approved in November, prohibits special preferences
based on race or gender in public education, contracting and hiring. As the
university wrestles with how to preserve diversity within the limits of I-200, admissions
policies, scholarships, outreach and recruitment programs have all been put up for
review." (Seattle Post-Intelligencer, 03/19/99, by Ruth Schubert)
Last Known Link:
http://www.seattle-pi.com/local/uw191.shtml
Washington (Seattle):
UW to Keep Minority Scholarships in
Spite of I-200 (03/17/99)
"After weeks of hearing student and donor concerns, the University of Washington is
backing down from a policy that would have ended many scholarships targeting minorities
and women.
"Worried about a conflict with the voter-approved Initiative 200, the UW had been
considering a halt to accepting donations for targeted scholarships. And university
officials talked about reviewing every existing scholarship for compliance with the law,
which bans the use of race, gender or national origin in state hiring, education and
contracting.
"But after student groups held a series of campus forums, arguing that the UW was
taking a more conservative approach toward I-200 than any other school in the state, the
university is retreating from its initial position in a new draft policy to be presented
to the Board of Regents on Friday.
"Under the new proposal, the university will accept new money for targeted
scholarships directly from donors, only requiring that the donors agree to put that money
in a "diversity fund." Students would be put into the candidate pool based on
merit, need or other neutral factors, but winners would be chosen according to the donors'
criteria, including race." (Seattle Times, 03/17/99, by Roberto Sanchez)
Last Known Link:
http://www.seattletimes.com/news/local/html98/univ_19990317.html
Washington
(Seattle):
Update - UW Law School Reverse Discrimination Suit (04/18/02)
[Adversity.Net] Katuria Smith, Angela Rock and Michael Pyle had been denied
admission to the UW Law School because they were not 'disadvantaged minorities'. The
judge in the case, U.S. District Court Judge Thomas S. Zilly is currently waiting for the
9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to act on challenges brought by the trio's lawyers from
the Center for Individual Rights, a nonprofit group in Washington, D.C., that opposes
race-based admissions policies.
While the legal beagles wrestle with the points of law, the rest of Washington State, and
the nation, anxiously await the outcome of this potential landmark decision against
race-based admissions in state colleges and universities. Interestingly, the passage
of I-200 in Washington, outlawing race-based criteria for admissions, jobs, and contracts,
is delaying the decision in this case. (Adversity.Net, 02/22/99)
Current Link:
http://adversity.net/ducation_3_washington_smithCIR.htm
Washington (Seattle):
UW makes enrolling minorities a
priority (05/11/99)
"The University of Washington is so concerned about losing minority students that
deans, vice presidents and even the UW president have personally called every minority
student selected for admission in an effort to persuade them to attend the school.
"The effort is an aggressive extension of a program the university began three years
ago, in which student volunteers placed telephone calls to greet each in-state applicant
accepted for the next year's freshman class.
"This year, for the first time, those calls are going to all of the roughly 9,000
students offered a place in the 1999-2000 class. And the UW Admissions Office has issued
lists of minority students who have been admitted to the deans of every college at the
university. The deans have called those students to answer questions about the university
and encourage them to attend." (Seattle Times 05/11/99 by Roberto Sanchez)
Last Known Link:
http://www.seattletimes.com/news/local/html98/call_19990511.html
Washington (Seattle):
Parent challeges race-based admissions
in public schools (01/30/99)
"Seattle Public Schools still use race as a factor in school assignments, but one
parent is threatening to sue, saying the practice violates Initiative 200's ban on the use
of racial preferences.
"Seattle lawyer Pat Brown, who is trying to get his son into Olympic View Elementary
School's popular all-day kindergarten, says that the school’s use of race is illegal
even though it is only one of three factors considered by the district in admissions.
"The district to some extent should be colorblind," says Brown, who is white.
"If Brown files suit, it could develop into the first legal test of Initiative 200,
the law passed by voters Nov. 3. The law bans preferences based on race, ethnicity and
gender in state and local public employment, contracting and education. (Seattle Times,
01/30/99, by Lynne K. Varner)
Last Known Link:
http://www.seattletimes.com/news/education/html98/race_013099.html
Washington (Seattle):
Efforts to "diversify"
colleges get mixed results after 30 years (10/18/98)
This is a "fair" article by Seattle Times IF you ignore their implicitly biased
assumption that it somehow falls to the colleges and universities to correct any presumed
"prior discrimination" through the use of quotas. Nonetheless, this
article examines the data of "college quotas" over the past 30 years and
concludes that the results are ambiguous: college racial quotas have failed to solve
the problem of historic racial discrimination. Gee, WE could have told 'em
that! (Based on Seattle Times 10/18/98)
Last Known Link:
www.seattletimes.com/news/local/html98/edaf_101898.html |
