Affirmative Action in Admission Policies

Affirmative action takes on many different forms when it comes to applying this concept to undergraduate and graduate admissions policies at universities nationwide. According to Mitchell Landberg in the Pittsburgh Post Gazette on January 19th, 2003, " The public universities of California, Texas, and Florida, whose race neutral admissions policies were applauded by president Bush this week, are notable for their efforts to achieve goals of affirmative action -racial diversity- without actually using affirmative action"(A-11). According to this statement, we must examine affirmative action policies as both a concept and an applied practice or theory. "Under the Supreme Court's 1978 Bakke decision, race is allowed to be weighed in as one factor in deciding who shall be admitted to college, and building a diverse student body is a permissible goal," states the Knight Rider Washington Bureau on January 16th, 2003. Therefore, the need to adopt an admissions policy to satisfy the Bakke decision took center stage at most universities across the nation. However, another stipulation in the Bakke decision adds that such admission policies cannot become quotas that would assure admissions based on race; it is only to be one subjective factor in the complex admissions policies. Universities across the nation had a difficult time establishing an admissions policy that would effectively meet all of the criteria listed above and decided upon by the Supreme Court.