A federal appeals court has overturned....

the state of Michigan's ban on Affirmative Action related to college admission practices.  With another federal appeals court having upheld a similar ban in California, this sets the stage for a showdown before the U.S. Supreme Court that may shape the future of college admissions policies for decades to come.

Before discussing this, I ask you to do me a favor.  Read all the way through rather than possibly getting disgusted at one point in what I'm about to say.  It's a small favor.

I'm of the mind that on the basis of how the Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution read, that Affirmative Action is flawed.  The Declaration says "...all men are created equal..." and the 14th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution's Equal Protection Clause says "All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws."

Affirmative Action makes some people more equal than others in giving them preferences in an effort to redress wrongs done to prior and the current generation.  From a strict constructionist viewpoint, this violates the notion that all are equal under the law.  So from that standpoint, Affirmative Action is wrong.

But when it comes to educational opportunity, the system has been flawed and skewed all the way back to the establishment of the institutions of public education that prepare children to become college students.  Even today, we see wide inequities in how public education operates in those areas where poverty is the norm rather than the exception, or almost entirely absent.  Not because the teachers in such schools aren't trying, but because of a variety of factors.  Parents who are too busy struggling to keep a roof over the family's heads and food on the table don't have the time to contribute to being involved in their children's educations.  High levels of crime that make such neighborhoods unsafe.  Gangs that offer what appear to be attractive alternatives to the process of becoming educated in order to improve one's circumstance.  Then there are the private schools that serve the affluent areas, many striving to provide opportunity and diversity by taking in students from economically challenged areas, but their budgets for such things are too limited to make significant inroads in spite of their best intentions.

The end result is a multi-tiered system of education, where the best private schools take in a few from these economically challenged areas, where the best public schools may or may not be able to handle and admit some of these students, and the majority of students from such areas simply do not have access to an equal system of education.  Their educational opportunities are limited and therefore unequal.

This is the driving reason why there needs to be a system of Affirmative Action in the college and university system.  It requires alteration.  But is most definitely needed.

How does it require alteration?  Let's look at two fictional students applying to the same university.  Both are Hispanic (substitute any other race or other factor you wish to make them non-Caucasian and therefore ineligible for a "preference" if it will make this easier to go with).  One lives in Beverly Hills with his parents, who are successful.  He has gone to an exclusive private school, where he achieved a weighted GPA of 4.5 due to taking Honors and AP classes.  He had a tutor prepare him for the SATs and he scored above 1900 on the test, putting him in the 88th percentile.

The other student lives with his single mother in a small apartment in South-Central Los Angeles.  She is working a full-time job and a part-time job and he is required to watch his younger sister at night while Mom is working.  In spite of the challenges he faces, he has earned a GPA of 3.4 at the public school where he is a student.   He scored 1743 on the SAT, putting him in the 72nd percentile.

The first student doesn't need the added benefit of race-based preferences in competing for college admission nearly as much as the second student does.  But the system as it currently exists not only provides him with that preference, it will rank him well ahead of the second student.  So we end up with those who are unequal within the group of unequals for whom we are attempting to provide redress.

Focus Affirmative Action on those who truly need it.  The goal of having a diverse student population can be met without having to provide preference to those who aren't victims of educational inopportunity.  Let the "equals" compete among themselves and aid the "unequals" in an effort to hopefully someday achieve equality of educational opportunity for all.