www.townhall.com/columnists/lindachavez/printlc20041110.shtml
For more than three decades, supporters of affirmative action have argued that racial preferences in higher education were absolutely vital if blacks and other minorities were to obtain college and professional degrees. In July 2003, the U.S. Supreme Court seemed to agree, at least with respect to law school admissions at the University of Michigan.
A new study, however, debunks the myth that those preferences are necessary even now, providing stunning evidence that affirmative action may actually hurt the chances of blacks to obtain law degrees.
Richard H. Sander, a law professor at UCLA and self described Democrat and lifelong supporter of affirmative action, has recently completed the most comprehensive look ever at the effect of affirmative action on the academic achievement of black law students. The study appears in the November issue of Stanford Law Review. Looking at the performance of black and other students at 21 law schools in th emid-1990s, Sander notes in the introduction to his study, "there has never been a comprehensive attempt to asses the relative costs and benefits of racial preferences in nay field of higher education."
Snader focuses on what he describes as the "costs" and "benefits" of affirmative action to blacks. He is less concerned about the harm such programs may do to better-qualified white and Asian students who have been passed over in the admission process than he is about what happens to less qualified blacks students who are admitted in their place. He argues that his data demonstrate that blacks are harmed by the very programs aimed at helping them. Most black applicants, he writes,"end up at schools where they will struggle academically and fail at thigher rates than they would in the absence of preferences...Perhaps, most remarkably, a strong case can be made that in the legal education system as a whole, racial preferences end up producing fewer blacks lawyers each year than would be produced by a race-blind system.......................
For more than three decades, supporters of affirmative action have argued that racial preferences in higher education were absolutely vital if blacks and other minorities were to obtain college and professional degrees. In July 2003, the U.S. Supreme Court seemed to agree, at least with respect to law school admissions at the University of Michigan.
A new study, however, debunks the myth that those preferences are necessary even now, providing stunning evidence that affirmative action may actually hurt the chances of blacks to obtain law degrees.
Richard H. Sander, a law professor at UCLA and self described Democrat and lifelong supporter of affirmative action, has recently completed the most comprehensive look ever at the effect of affirmative action on the academic achievement of black law students. The study appears in the November issue of Stanford Law Review. Looking at the performance of black and other students at 21 law schools in th emid-1990s, Sander notes in the introduction to his study, "there has never been a comprehensive attempt to asses the relative costs and benefits of racial preferences in nay field of higher education."
Snader focuses on what he describes as the "costs" and "benefits" of affirmative action to blacks. He is less concerned about the harm such programs may do to better-qualified white and Asian students who have been passed over in the admission process than he is about what happens to less qualified blacks students who are admitted in their place. He argues that his data demonstrate that blacks are harmed by the very programs aimed at helping them. Most black applicants, he writes,"end up at schools where they will struggle academically and fail at thigher rates than they would in the absence of preferences...Perhaps, most remarkably, a strong case can be made that in the legal education system as a whole, racial preferences end up producing fewer blacks lawyers each year than would be produced by a race-blind system.......................
