UGA Settles Law School Reverse Discrimination Suit for $55,000

UGA Settles With White Students Who Sued Over Law-School Admissions (02/07/01 - pay site)

"The University of Georgia agreed on Tuesday to pay $55,000 to settle a lawsuit brought by two white applicants who were rejected from the institution's law school. The students charged that the university had unconstitutionally used race as a factor in deciding not to admit them.

"In settling the case, university officials did not admit to wrongdoing and will not change the law school's admissions process. They also said they wanted to close the books on this lawsuit so the institution can continue to devote most of its resources to defending another lawsuit, which challenges the institution's use of race in undergraduate admissions. The university has appealed that case to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit.

UGA Story Index:

(1)	Federal Judge (11th Circuit) Flatly Rejects UGA Racial Quotas
(2)	UGA Vows to Keep Quotas; Promises to Go to Supreme Court
(3)	UGA Law School Suit Settled for $55,000 so UGA can devote energies to keeping quotas.

According to the Chronicle of Higher Education, UGA president Michael F. Adams said: "This is consistent with our pattern in settling the other extraneous admissions cases in order to keep our focus on the main, major case. Everybody agreed that the law school does not have to change its current admissions process, so this settlement keeps the status quo while we press forward with our appeal in the 11th Circuit."

"The law-school case was filed in May 2000 by Virginia Noble and Robert Homlar, who applied to Georgia in 1999 and argue that their academic records were better than those of some students who were admitted to the institution. Under the settlement, the university will pay Ms. Noble -- who is in her second year at the Mercer University School of Law -- $20,000 to make up the difference between the cost of attending Mercer and what she would have paid at Georgia. Mr. Homlar, who is in his second year at the University of South Carolina School of Law, will get $15,000. The university also will pay $20,000 in legal fees.

"... Mr. Parks called the settlement a "good solution," since the plaintiffs are well into their second year of law school and one of them is now able to attend the University of Georgia before it's too late. He added: "At least Georgia will have to consider very hard their decision to use race in the future. It is becoming an increasingly expensive proposition for them."

"... In the undergraduate case that Georgia is appealing, three white women who were denied admission to the university in 1999 charged that they had been discriminated against, and argued that they would have been admitted if they had been members of a minority group. While the lawsuit is pending, the university has temporarily discontinued its practice of using race as one factor in weighing whether to admit borderline freshman applicants. University officials want to use the case as a way to force federal courts, which have issued a wide array of rulings on how colleges may or may not use affirmative action, to spell out when race can be used as a factor in admissions and other decisions." Excerpted from the article by Sara Hebel in the Chronicle of Higher Education 02/07/01.

[Link to PAY site: http://www.chronicle.com/daily/2001/02/2001020702n.htm ]

END Education - (3) UGA Settles Law School Suit