Gratz v. Bollinger and Grutter v. Bollinger were cases argued in front of the United States Supreme Court regarding the use of race in college admission policies. It took over two months for the Court to decide and it issued decisions on the cases on 23 June 2003. Both cases “involved the University of Michigan; Gratz v. Bollinger concerned the undergraduate college while Grutter v. Bollinger concerned the law school”. These cases received national attention and public opinion was divided. While “most admission offices agree that racial diversity on campus is a good thing”, some questioned its value and whether it had any value at all and whether it was worth achieving . If it did have value, questions arose about how it should be achieved. In newspapers, television programs and radio broadcasts, a variety of opinions were expressed, and few prominent figures felt that there was no inherent value in diversity and colleges should not actively try to achieve this goal. Stanley Rothman, professor emeritus at Smith College, was one such figure and believed that “college diversity programs fail to raise standards”.
In an op-ed published in the New York Times titled “Is Diversity Overrated?”, Rothman argues that the contention “that a diverse student body necessarily improves the quality of education for everyone … is questionable”. Based on the results of a study he cites, he says that “Students … responded to increasing racial diversity by registering increased dissatisfaction with the quality of education”. He finally concludes that “a higher level of diversity is associated with somewhat less educational satisfaction and worse race relations among students”. Here, Rothman is correct when he says that overall standards, in terms of GPA, are indeed worse. For students whose educational satisfaction is derived from just GPA and the academic prestige of their university, it is likely that diversity will lead to less educational satisfaction. For students who only value sitting with their books and being committed to their studies, a more diverse student body will have no benefit. However, educational satisfaction is much more than GPA for a large majority of students. At a university, a lot of learning takes place outside the classroom. Life skills are learned not from books or tests, but through interactions with fellow students. Lawrence H. Summers and Laurence H. Tribe, the president of Harvard University and a constitutional law professor at Harvard respectively, write that “… today’s students must be prepared to live and work in a global economy and a multicultural world”. Being exposed to a diverse student body achieves this objective and broadens an individual’s world view and teaches them how to interact with individuals of all backgrounds. As Summers and Tribe continue, “… universities have learned that racial diversity helps students confront perspectives other than their own, forcing them to think more rigorously and imaginatively”. Redefining educational satisfaction in this manner will then lead to diversity increasing the satisfaction students receive, contrary to what Rothman argues. Further, as Andrew Milne points out in a Letter to the Editor, “So universities with more diverse student bodies have more reports of racial discrimination. What a surprise! I would have thought those all-white schools would have much greater problems with racial tension”. Milne’s sarcasm aside, racial tension will obviously be higher where there are a greater number of races. Worse race relations on college campuses are not necessarily a bad thing, however. This tension usually arises not from hate, but ignorance. Due to a lack of understanding, students of different ethnic groups may associate certain stereotypes with one another leading to worse relations. “Diversity … helps break down prejudices and stereotypes by showing students that every ethnic community includes a broad range of viewpoints and experiences and that imagined differences often turn out to be only skin deep”. Promoting diversity of college campuses can then make this problem go away as it leads to the ignorance being reduced to a great extent.
However, there is a belief that plans intended to make the student body more diverse end up violating equality of opportunity. James Traub, an American journalist who often writes for the New York Times, says that policies designed to achieve diversity will always disadvantage another group of people; “…“affirmative action” carries an explicitly zero-sum connotation; if one group… is being advantaged, another group is, of course, being disadvantaged”. He argues that such policies are “a tremendous boon to minority students, who otherwise would have attended less elite institutions” while it was “a pleasant side benefit” for most white students. He also says that “the difference in the nature of benefits is so obvious and overwhelming”. The reality is quite different, however. The policies which Traub takes issue with are actually beneficial to all; former Supreme Court Associate Justice Sandra Day O’ Connor said, “…numerous studies show that student body diversity promotes learning outcomes … and better prepares them as professionals”. Being given the chance to attend elite institutions results in a tremendous ocean of opportunities being opened up, which would otherwise not be available to members of a minority group. “Individuals with law degrees occupy roughly half the seats in United States Senate, and more than a third of seats in the United States House of Representatives” (O’ Connor). Lawyers make up the majority of the government and are educated at law schools. “Access to legal education (and thus the legal profession) must be inclusive of talented and qualified individuals of every race and ethnicity”, “…it is necessary that the path to leadership be visibly open to talented and qualified individuals of every race and ethnicity” (O’Connor). Society moves forward when those who govern are truly representative of the people and working towards diversity realises this goal. Instead of violating equality of opportunity, such policies actually promote it. The value of diversity on a local and national level is clear; there are definitely great advantages in pursuing policies that promote diversity. The next question which comes up, then, is how college campuses must work towards achieving diversity. There are a variety of proposals and most proposals disagree on implementation and not the objectives themselves; most proposals recognize the value of diversity. As James Traub points out, “The two sides disagree only about the acceptable means of attaining this supreme good.” . George W. Bush’s administration proposed that the top 10 percent of high school graduates should be automatically admitted to state-funded universities to adopt a ‘race-neutral’ approach. The University of Michigan’s policy which caused the controversy, awarded 20 points to a member of a minority (a minimum of 100 is required to secure admission). Amy Ziebarth, the executive director of New Jersey Seeds, an organization that works with disadvantaged students, believes that affirmative action should no longer be race-based, but class-based. She says “Class-based methods use financial and geographic indicators rather than skin color to determine whether a student will have something unique to bring to the table”. She further goes on to say, “Class-based diversity programs can be used to achieve the same ends because most minorities tend to be poorer than whites”.
I believe that Ziebarth’s class-based approach will be the most effective towards achieving a diverse student population. Shifting the focus of diversity from race to class will reduce the great disparities that exist today. They are also likely to face less opposition since they focus on making world-class education available to the poorest in our society and guarantee more equity amongst the races, classes and genders. The plans mentioned above discuss achieving diversity at the college level, but many believe that it is too late by then; “Diversity distracts us from a simple but painful truth, which is that persistent black educational failure … has made it impossible for the most selective schools to become substantially integrated using their own traditional criteria of merit.” (Traub). The financing of public schools in the United States comes from property taxes paid in a particular district. Districts in which minorities reside often have poorer public schools as their living conditions are worse. This leads to the education being received by minority students being of a substandard quality which in turn makes it difficult for these students to get into the best universities and make the student population more diverse. The disparity in funding which comes about because of the current public-school structure must be tackled and the school system must undergo fundamental reform to guarantee the quality of education is similar or close to similar, irrespective of geographical location. By doing this, schools can become less segregated and diversity and its value will be understood at the grassroots level. One way to do this is to trust that each child’s parents are the best people to make decisions regarding the education of their child and give the parents the choice of which school to send their child to. This can be done only if the system no longer relies on ZIP code and the government instead provides school vouchers to parents, thereby making them free to choose which school to send their child to. Another way to call for more equitable funding across the board and change the way schools are funded, making the decisions more centralised. These solutions can help the students, promote diversity and lead to a society which strives to provide the best education for all its citizens, regardless of race, class or skin colour.