Zach Bleemer
Appearances
It's Been a Minute
How "race-neutral" can universities really be?
Well, we've been talking about all of these super selective universities. Fewer than 1% of Americans go to an Ivy League school. There's been massive growth in the public sector. There's been very substantial growth in a for-profit sector. Lots of things have changed over the last 50 years about which universities which students go to. It's worth emphasizing that
It's Been a Minute
How "race-neutral" can universities really be?
And so if you look at the least selective schools, they actually gain in Black and Hispanic enrollment.
It's Been a Minute
How "race-neutral" can universities really be?
While it is true that over the past 50 or 60 years, college has gotten relatively more stratified. So rich kids are getting relatively greater value from going to college and poor kids are getting relatively less value from going to college. Very little of that is about university admission. Rich kids have always had far greater access to very high quality universities.
It's Been a Minute
How "race-neutral" can universities really be?
Those universities have gotten better over time, which is to say, the US over the last 40 years has very substantially invested in its flagship public universities and not so much in local comprehensive universities that enroll the plurality of American college students.
It's Been a Minute
How "race-neutral" can universities really be?
But I don't think that the selection across schools is really first order in explaining at a high level what's happening in American higher education. It's obviously the most politically salient question at the moment. Which kids get to go to these universities that enroll less than 1% of Americans, but whose graduates go on to tremendous success in the U.S.?
It's Been a Minute
How "race-neutral" can universities really be?
So admitting students on the basis of parental income is a lot more expensive than admitting students on the basis of race for schools that are trying to provide financial aid to meet or close to meeting students' financial need as defined by a federal expected family contribution.
It's Been a Minute
How "race-neutral" can universities really be?
And the reason these things aren't so closely paired to each other is that when it comes to academic preparation, they're kind of additive in the way they contribute to student preparation. So what I mean by that is if you're lower income, you have lower SAT scores than if you're higher income. That's true overall, but it's also true within race.
It's Been a Minute
How "race-neutral" can universities really be?
So if you just look at black applicants to college, lower income black applicants have much lower test scores than higher income black applicants.
It's Been a Minute
How "race-neutral" can universities really be?
And so if you just target race, you tend to get middle income and at some schools higher income black and Hispanic students because the lower income black and Hispanic students have even lower test scores and providing a bump just on the basis of race won't be enough for those kids.
It's Been a Minute
How "race-neutral" can universities really be?
On the flip side, when you target just on the basis of income, you tend to get lower income white and Asian students because the lower income black and Hispanic students tend to have even lower test scores and the bump isn't sufficient for them.
It's Been a Minute
How "race-neutral" can universities really be?
And so you sort of end up with different groups under these two different policies, but also race-based affirmative action tends to bring in middle-income or sometimes upper-income students who need much less financial aid than the lower-income white and Asian students who tend to get pulled in by class-based affirmative action.
It's Been a Minute
How "race-neutral" can universities really be?
It's worth thinking a little bit about where this term is coming from. You have to already think that the appropriate way for universities to conduct admissions is by SAT scores and grades and academic preparation at both public and private universities. You have to think that we have these amazing public and private university resources in the U.S.
It's Been a Minute
How "race-neutral" can universities really be?
Like you said, they can really change kids' lives. And so which kids should we give those to? Well, one group of kids we could give them to are the kids who did really well in high school.
It's Been a Minute
How "race-neutral" can universities really be?
Something people noticed when they started implementing those policies in the 1960s is there just weren't that many black and Hispanic and lower income and otherwise disadvantaged kids who were super high performing in high school.
It's Been a Minute
How "race-neutral" can universities really be?
And affirmative action came from an interest in maintaining some notion of representation while also trying to provide greater educational resources to kids who were thought to be able to best take advantage of them.
It's Been a Minute
How "race-neutral" can universities really be?
Now that race-based affirmative action is unavailable to universities, you might think that there are alternative and, like you said, sort of race-neutral means by which universities could try to fulfill the same end. They have an interest in targeting the most academically prepared students. But they also want to keep their doors open from kids from every background.
It's Been a Minute
How "race-neutral" can universities really be?
And so states that have guaranteed admission to top students from every high school in the state, even if they're relatively lower testing. Texas has this. California, Florida, Georgia all have similar programs. Actually, the SUNY system in New York is just about to start such a program. Schools that have gone test optional or in California's case, test blind.
It's Been a Minute
How "race-neutral" can universities really be?
These are all ways of trying to provide opportunity to kids who really didn't have the opportunity to be the highest performing high school students.
It's Been a Minute
How "race-neutral" can universities really be?
It's worth thinking a little bit about where this term is coming from.
It's Been a Minute
How "race-neutral" can universities really be?
I really think it's worth distinguishing here between public and private universities. It's unreasonable for the university to implement an admissions policy that just shuts doors disproportionately for students who now make up the majority of the state of California.
It's Been a Minute
How "race-neutral" can universities really be?
And so I think public universities have long felt a direct part of their mission is representation of their state, not just in terms of race, but also in terms of geography and class and any kind of student background and any large gaps between the high school graduating population and the students on campus.
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How "race-neutral" can universities really be?
reflect badly, university administrators think, because they suggest that the California population that has invested in and built UCLA is not as a whole deriving UCLA's benefits.
It's Been a Minute
How "race-neutral" can universities really be?
Why private universities would implement these policies is very much up to the private university. So just to pull two examples, one university you already mentioned is Northwestern, a second is Georgetown. And there's no reason for Northwestern and Georgetown to have even overlapping missions in the sense that Northwestern is sort of typical of many private universities in the U.S.
It's Been a Minute
How "race-neutral" can universities really be?
It is effectively owned and managed by alumni and donors to the university. And it's admitting whichever students it thinks best serve the private missions of that institution. Georgetown is a Jesuit university. It's owned by the church. And its mission might have nothing to do with, for example, perpetuating alumni wealth or promoting alumni activities on campus. It might.
It's Been a Minute
How "race-neutral" can universities really be?
It's allowed to do whatever it wants except for admit students on the basis of race.
It's Been a Minute
How "race-neutral" can universities really be?
What we've seen in states that have banned affirmative action is that some schools have basically no effect in terms of their Black and Hispanic enrollment due to a cascade effect. So UC Berkeley doesn't have an affirmative action program. They might not get into Berkeley, but they're still going to go to college somewhere.