My Thoughts on a couple of the recent
United States Supreme Court decisions
By Kimberly Harris, M.Ed.
Distinctive Voice Consulting
August 2023
In two
Supreme Court decisions in late June 2023, I find myself mourning the loss of
advancement opportunities for BIPOC and low-income people. Specifically, concerning
the conservative majority’s votes in the cases of: Students for Fair Admissions
versus President and Fellows of Harvard College, Students for Fair Admission
versus University of North Carolina, Biden versus Nebraska, and the Department
of Education versus Brown. The decision to eliminate programs that allow for
race-based admissions in colleges and the rejection of Biden’s student loan
forgiveness program are two decisions that I fear take America backwards and
decrease opportunities to create equity by leveling the playing field.
For review, the Students for Fair Admissions versus President and Fellows of Harvard College, and Students for Fair Admission versus University of North Carolina are cases that involve considering race in college admissions. Race based college admissions were programs that stemmed from affirmative action programs, which were created to offset past racial wrong doings against black and brown people. The programs utilized race as a consideration in admissions to mitigate the effects of systemic racism. Race based consideration in admissions expanded admissions criteria to look at a student’s background to include mitigating circumstances. Such mitigating circumstances may have included financial barriers, family struggles, and primary and secondary attending schools with low budgets that may have affected their college admissions test scores and grade point averages. The idea was to recruit, educate and graduate minority students with the propensity to excel in college despite their challenging circumstances: students who, otherwise would not have been considered for top tier colleges based on grades and admissions test scores.
Why am I
passionate about this issue? Because I was one of these students. I was raised
with mitigating circumstances yet had the academic ability to excel in school.
Despite lower than desired standardized test scores on the SAT, I was able to
graduate with honors from two of the top schools in the country.
Most college
admissions requirements stem from the original purpose of college which was to
educate Christian white men. Fast-forward to today and college has become a
dream of the masses where people know that advanced education is the ticket to
better employment opportunities and increased income earning potential.
Standardized tests were multiple choice mental tests created to categorize,
sort, and route the population. But whose mind created the test to sort people?
Who created the criteria for the evaluation of who scored well and who did not?
Those whose thinking matches the logic and reasoning of the test creator, do
well, while those who have a diversity of thought or experience from the mind
of the test creator, do not. It is no secret that standardized college
admissions exams have been labeled bias and that some schools have relaxed the
requirement on these exams.
Allowing
colleges to look at the whole student for college admissions is a more just way
of evaluating a student’s ability in college and creates increased diversity. Diversity
in college and in schools have been proven to improve the education of the
students. As such, education administrators now understand the importance of
diversity in schools and will find other means to define diversity for the sake
of better academic outcomes for all. People who think that banning race in
admissions will give them a greater chance for admissions over someone who
comes from lower educational pedigree will be greatly disappointed. The myth of
meritocracy is just that, a myth. The students with the highest-grade point
averages and the highest standardized test scores may not be the best student
for a particular college. We need to continue to look at the whole student,
their background and challenges they overcame to create a well-rounded student
body in higher education. Was this decision by the Supreme Court in line with
the American public? According to recent news polls, most white and Asian
people agree with the decision while Latinos are split and most
African-American people disagree with the decision. It appears that public
opinion is self-serving here with those who believe they will benefit from the
decision supporting it while those who think they will be disadvantaged by the
decision not supporting the Supreme Court’s decision. But when making these
decisions we need to think of the greater good and creating the best learning
environment for students which diversity has been proven to do.
To recap
Biden v. Nebraska and Department of Education v. Brown, these cases involve
student loan debt relief for millions of Americans who borrowed money to attend
college and improve their lives. From an equity, diversity, and inclusion
standpoint, I find this decision disheartening. In my humble opinion, undergraduate
education, like the K-12 education, should be free to those who show the
propensity to graduate. Professional schools should be subsidized and society
should encourage the education of its citizenry because it is better for people
to have the ability to financially support themselves and in turn the ability
to pay taxes to support our economy and government.
A poor, uneducated society does not serve the society well. Look at third world countries, as an example. Our government should be able to support individual society needs in a similar fashion to how we support big business. There are theories abound about how trickle-down economics do not work and greatly contribute to income inequality, making the rich richer and the poor poorer, while the middle class gets erased. Because of America’s love affair with individual responsibility versus community collaboration, only two in five people support Biden’s debt forgiveness program of up to $20K for individuals earning less than $125k per year and couples earning less than $250k per year. Student loan debt is a tax on the middle class that punishes middle and low-income people for not having the family wealth necessary to go to college without student loans. It is a vicious cycle where the rich have the financial capital to earn an education to continue their wealth journey while the have-nots borrow money for college which saddles them with debt upon completing college (if they do finish) and hinders their financial growth.
I believe in
a hybrid approach to society. There should be individual responsibility with a
twist. We must have a system to broaden the circle of opportunity to for those
who were not born to wealthy families. We must create opportunity for those
capable in society. As we do so, we explore greater growth for our community
and society. Who knows what gifts and talents that child born into poverty can
offer our society: a cure for cancer, the solution to climate change, or
perhaps being a game changer or community builder who writes blogs to give
people different perspectives to make the world a better place?
If you are
interested in training and more conversations about equity and inclusion,
please contact me at DistinctiveVoiceConsulting@gmail.com or visit my website
www.DistinctiveVoiceConsulting.com
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