Race shouldn’t be a consideration in whether to admit a particular student. But it should be used on an ongoing basis to ensure that the admission process is applied fairly.
Then, if it’s determined that there’s a racial bias in admissions, the root cause should be analyzed and corrected. Are students of one race better prepared academically? That’s a problem that needs to be fixed at the high school level (or earlier). If you admit students who aren’t prepared for college-level courses, you either have to spend resources on remedial classes, or have a lot of students from that race drop out.
Are students of one race more able to pay? If we want everyone to have the same chance at education regardless of background, maybe college should be fully government-funded.
That’s a problem that needs to be fixed at the high school level (or earlier).
What ability does a private university like Harvard have to affect the equity of primary or secondary education across the entire country? This sounds good, but who is doing the fixing? The same people who are stripping away the ability for colleges and universities to address inequity by considering it in their admissions policies are also strip mining public education. Maybe AA was a bandaid but ripping off the bandaid because it would be better to fix the injury, but having no ability or will to fix the injury, just means that now you’re bleeding all over the place.
