Affirmative Action Damages Talented Minority Kids

Stuart Taylor Jr. writes, for The American Spectator, about the damage racial admissions preferences of elite universities do to minority students. Black and Hispanic students are recruited to help campuses meet affirmative action quotas, not because it is what is best for the students.

Only 1 to 2 percent of black college applicants emerge from high school well-qualified academically for (say) the top Ivy League colleges. Therefore, those schools can meet their racial admissions targets only by using large preferences. They bring in black students who are well qualified for moderately elite schools like (say) the University of North Carolina, but not for the Ivies that recruit them. This leaves schools like UNC able to meet their own racial targets only by giving large preferences to black students who are well qualified for less selective schools like (say) the University of Missouri but not for UNC. And so on down the selectivity scale.

As a result, experts agree, most black students at even moderately selective schools — with high school preparation and test scores far below those of their classmates — rank well below the middle of their college and grad school classes, with between 25% and 50% ranking in the bottom tenth. That’s a very bad place to be at any school.

This, in turn, increases these students’ isolation and self-segregation from the higher-achieving Asians and whites who flourish in more challenging courses.

It is critical to understand that these are not bad students. They did well in high school and could excel at somewhat less selective universities where they would arrive roughly as well prepared as their classmates.

But due to racial preferences, they find themselves for the first time in their lives competing against classmates who have a huge head start in terms of previous education, academic ability, or both.

Could we ever be realistic enough to say that the most highly competitive universities would be meeting their quotas if they managed to attract the "1 to 2 percent of black college applicants (who) emerge from high school well-qualified academically for (say) the top Ivy League colleges"? That's what should happen, but sadly the SJWs won't stand for it.