Admissions

Research related to College Admissions

More than 800 Scholars File Brief with U.S. Supreme Court Supporting Diversity Policies in College Admissions

More than 800 social scientists from all parts of the U.S. recently submitted a brief to the U.S. Supreme Court presenting evidence on the need to maintain colleges’ rights to consider race as one of many factors in selecting students. We believe that this brief is the most massive outpouring of scholarly support ever for a social science brief in a civil rights case.

Race, Class, and College Access: Achieving Diversity in a Shifting Legal Landscape

This report was produced by Pearson, ACE and the CRP to broaden the understanding of the work and challenges facing institutions and further much-needed dialogue on how they can best respond to a shifting policy and legal landscape at a time when access to postsecondary education has never been more vital and our American citizenry never so diverse.

Statement on the Development of the Brief of American Social Science Researchers in Fisher v. University of Texas

We hope that this brief will be of use to other parties participating in all American colleges and to the justices and the clerks themselves. Hundreds of experts have participated in this important effort to communicate what is known about the obstacles to and the conditions for achieving successfully diverse campuses that can best prepare young Americans to live and work in an extremely multiracial future.

California: A Case Study in the Loss of Affirmative Action

Notwithstanding the initial commitment to educate “all portions” of the state’s youth, underrepresented minorities (URMs) have never achieved equal representation in the UC and their representation has declined since the mid-1990s just as their share of the state’s population has burgeoned.

The Impact of Affirmative Action Bans in Graduate Education

This report contributes to the mounting evidence about the detrimental effects bans on affirmative action have had on the representation of students of color in postsecondary education. Specifically, the bans in Texas, California, Washington, and Florida have reduced by about 12 percent the average proportion of graduate students of color across all the fields of graduate study included in the evaluation.