Eight months after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down the use of race in college admissions, a conservative Wisconsin law firm is drawing attention to what it says are Universities of Wisconsin programs that continue to consider race in other areas, while the state’s flagship university says it’s reviewing programs that might be affected by the court’s ruling.
The Wednesday letter from the Wisconsin Institute for Law and Liberty says the court’s June 29 ruling in Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard, was “not limited to admissions” but impacts “all university policies and programs where race is a factor.”
The firm points to 10 programs or scholarships run by the Board of Regents, UW-Madison, UW-Parkside, UW-Whitewater and UW-Green Bay, but says “there are likely more.”
“We call on you to investigate any remaining race-based policies or programs and open them up to all students, regardless of race,” says the letter by Daniel Lennington of WILL’s Equality Under the Law Project.
People are also reading…
UW system spokesperson Mark Pitsch declined to comment on the WILL letter. In January, he told the online news site WisPolitics that the system expected to eliminate race as a factor in most scholarships by the end of the academic year.
UW-Madison spokesperson John Lucas referred questions about the letter to the UW system. Shortly after the court’s Harvard ruling, the university said it would remove race as a factor in its admissions process.
UW-Madison political science and law professor Howard Schweber said it’s not surprising that an anti-affirmative action group such as WILL is “trying to promote a maximalist reading of what the court said” in the Harvard case that goes beyond just admissions but said the court’s decision is murkier than WILL and other such groups let on.
He noted that in the court’s decision, Chief Justice John Roberts “complicated the issue by insisting that colleges remain free to consider race as an element of a student’s individual experience and give weight to that experience.”
WILL’s challenge raises a key question for how the decision is interpreted in other areas in higher education and elsewhere in society, Schweber said: “Does the (court’s) principle banning race preferences apply only at the point of admission, or does it apply to all programs having to do with educational success and participation?”
The point of WILL’s letter is to set the table for more litigation on the constitutionality of race-based programs more generally, he said. Lennington in his letter urges UW to complete some of the changes it’s made since the Harvard decision, saying “refusal or delay may result in liability, including federal investigations or lawsuits, under Title VI and other federal civil rights laws.”
UW reports 164 race-based programs
It’s not clear how many scholarships, grants, study-abroad programs, fellowships and hiring programs in the UW system are awarded at least partly based on race. WisPolitics reported in January that in response to a public records request, the Universities of Wisconsin, not including UW-Madison, identified 164 programs such programs as of Oct. 23.
WisPolitics also asked for the same information from UW-Madison but withdrew the request when the university said it would cost the political news site $1,000 in university staff time to compile the information.
Lucas told the Wisconsin State Journal that the university “continues to review” programs that could be affected by the Supreme Court ruling and “therefore doesn’t have a current count to share at this time.”
He and Pitsch also could not immediately provide the total number of such programs — ones that take race into account and ones that don’t — although Pitsch said that if considering just scholarships and grants, “a very rough estimate” would be 4,000 to 6,000 across the Universities of Wisconsin, “with as many as 1,000 or more duplicated across more than one university.”
Race considerations in admissions unpopular
It’s not clear if there’s been polling conducted to ascertain how Wisconsin residents feel about using race in college admissions or other programs, but national polling shows more opposition to using them in admissions than support.
The Marquette Law School Poll from February found 75% in favor of the Supreme Court’s decision in the Harvard case and 25% opposed.
Pew Research Center polling last year before the court’s decision found 50% of adult Americans “disapprove of selective colleges considering race and ethnicity in admissions decisions.” Thirty-three percent approved and 16% were not sure.
The consideration of race in admissions only really comes into play at elite private and state colleges, including UW-Madison, because most colleges are not selective and admit most of their applicants.
Among the programs WILL highlighted are:
- The Board of Regents 2024 Diversity Awards, worth $7,500 each to “students who are members of historically underrepresented populations (including African American, Native America, Hispanic/Latino, Asian American, and Southeast Asian), first-generation and/or economically disadvantaged.”
- The UW-Madison Kemper-Knapp Fellowship open to students “from underrepresented backgrounds, such as students of color and low-income first-generation students.”
- The UW-Parkside Chase Diversity Scholarship, which states that the “recipient must be a student of color and must show evidence of leadership activities.”