Affirmative-Action Update: Where Are All the Black Students?

DiversityInc.com ^ | July 24, 2006 | Compiled by the DiversityInc staff

[GSlob]

"The CREAM will rise to the top!"
Cream is not the only thing that floats to the top. Check any septic tank for an object illustration.

[GSlob]

"I think a person can achieve most anything they want [within one's ability] if they apply themselves and work hard."
I corrected it. Now it sounds more true. For example, even if you started playing chess at age 3, and have done nothing else ever since, would you be able to win a match against Kasparov?

[randog]

They keepin' it REAL! Don't want no suckah-jive EDJEECATION..!

Fo' shizzle, yo!

[Lizavetta]

I would love to see a long term study on where all the affirmative action students wound up.......how many graduated, how many transferred to other colleges, what they're doing for a living now, how many dropped out, etc.

I refuse to believe that in today's society that any black who was willing to work hard and persevere will not get ahead and succeed like anybody else.

[SeafoodGumbo]

In case some of ya'll have never seen the blog Discriminations, it's the best one out there on racial quotas and preferences.

[PeteB570]

Maybe, maybe not.

Some abilities can be sharpened if they are there to begin with. If there is no ability then there will be little gain.

Since I didn't apply myself in that direction I'll never know one way or the other.

I would think that putting work and effort into getting into college would have better results than trying to play world class chess. After all, most college students have a public school background. :-)

[jjw]

I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.

Martin Luther King, Jr.

[TheCipher]

UC may not be able to reinstate affirmative action, but the devastating decline in black enrollment has spawned discussion about how to revive the university's diversity within the boundaries of the law

For UCLA: DIVERSITY = BLACK

I guess Asians and other minorites don't count.

[shalom aleichem]

I recall when this Ward Conery deal came up, Rush would have Dr. Walter Williams on as his replacement host who would in turn have Thomas Sowell on, and they (both highly educated Blacks) had very frank discussions. Their main point of agreement was don't "force" Blacks to the elite schools like UCLA or Berkeley but allow them to attend UC-Irvine or Riverside, places more on their academic level, and they will be successful. To toss them into a pool of much higher equipped and achieving students is really not fair or productive. They end up at the bottom of the class and become discouraged real fast. Where they could be a graduate of a mainline university, they become a drop-out and failure at an elite institution.

[combat_boots]

"I guess Asians and other minorites don't count."

True. Furthermore, what DOES a UCLA-or any other university for that matter-degree mean when standards sink disproportionately as the 'diversity' rises?

[combat_boots]

"males attending college? /s :P"

Young men who aren't gay still go to college for degrees other than medicine, engineering, law or business?

[An American in Turkiye]

I'm still waiting for the NBA to start affirmative-action. There is a strikingly few amount of white players.

Oh wait. They actually recruit the people most qualified. Hmmmmm..... Makes sense to me. When will colleges follow suit?

[radiohead]

I don't think the low numbers for black students has to do with them not wanting an education. My experience as a black female academic in a state w/no affirmative action for public universities has exposed me to many black students who will not apply to schools where there is no affirmative action. They equate it with racism and assume that they won't be welcome.

I have tried to get these students to understand that if they have the grades (and most do), they can compete with anyone. But, they can't get past the implied racism. In Washington state, there are still financial aid programs for minorities, so they can't say that no AA means no financial aid.

Personally, I'd rather compete and show myself that I can get in anywhere, even if, for some bizarre reason, I thought that no AA means the Klan is running the campus. But many students take what I consider to be the easy way out and don't apply. I think the low numbers of admitted black students is not because they can't compete with white students, but because fewer of them apply; the pool is smaller.

[JustaDumbBlonde]

Thank you for that insight -- very interesting. Do you think that we can overcome the mistaken impression that no affirmative action equals racism? Treating everyone the same, with no special considerations for race, would indicate 'no' racism to me.

[Myrddin]

The UC system reserved 5% of the entrance slots for affirmative action before prop 209 made it illegal. A full 87% of the people admitted under affirmative action dropped out the first year. Less that 2% ever made it to graduation day. The 5% carved out to accomodate affirmative action caused many highly qualified candidates of the wrong color to be rejected. It was a terrible failure as a program. If you can meet the academic standards to get into the school, color will not be an impediment to your admission. If you don't meet the standards, your fellow students will shred you academically. The affirmative action preference stops at the admissions office. The students and professors will not cut you any slack.

[gaijin]

YOU ROCK!

[radiohead]

YOU ROCK!

Thank you. I'm here all week.

[DeweyCA]

You may recall that Prop 209 was started as a backlash by s couple conservative Bay-area profs because the Dem-controlled CA Assembly had passed a bill (vetoed by Wilson) requiring AA quotas to extend to grading and graduation.

[radiohead]

Do you think that we can overcome the mistaken impression that no affirmative action equals racism?

I don't know. I guess it depends on people's backgrounds and mindsets. I think it is very difficult to change the mind of a person who is still on the Dim plantation. For most of them, racism is in everybody, every institution, every process. For them, you can't escape it. It's like being a damn feminist.

[Myrddin]

I have tried to get these students to understand that if they have the grades (and most do), they can compete with anyone. But, they can't get past the implied assumed racism.