The June 29 U.S. Supreme Court decision Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard concerned the affirmative action programs at Harvard University and the University of North Carolina.
However, the decision will impact all universities across the country, including Catholic institutions.
In the 6-3 decision, authored by Chief Justice John Roberts, the nation’s highest court effectively struck down public and private universities’ ability to include race-based affirmative action in their admissions decisions.
For decades, many universities have used affirmative action in their admissions programs to increase minority representation on their campuses. However, some have argued that affirmative action promotes the admission of certain ethnic minorities at the expense of others, often negatively impacting Asian students.
In the ruling, Roberts wrote that “Harvard’s consideration of race has led to an 11.1% decrease in the number of Asian-Americans admitted to Harvard.”
Leaders of numerous individual Catholic universities strongly criticized the decision, as did the Association of Catholic Colleges and Universities (ACCU). The association, founded in 1899, has dozens of Catholic institutions as members and describes itself as the “voice of Catholic higher education.”
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