June 29, 2023

On the Death Knell of Affirmative Action

 As you've probably read (if not, you can do so here), the Supreme Court pretty much ended affirmative action in college admissions today by a 6-3 vote.  Although not a plurality opinion, the long-ass majority opinion by Roberts, comparatively brief concurring opinion by Gorsuch (which I actually found helpful), rambling stream-of-consciousness concurring opinion by Thomas (which reads like what I'd imagine James Joyce would have written had he been in the Federalist Society and on cocaine), lengthy emotional dissent by Kagan, and a heavy-on-results light-on-the-law dissent from Jackson, there's a lot to unpack.

The result isn't a surprise.  What did come as a surprise was the peek behind the curtain into Harvard's admissions.  Applicants are initially scored 1-6 (with 1 being the highest) on 6 categories: academic, extracurricular, athletic, school support, personal, and overall.  The opinion doesn't say but I think it's safe to assume that the majority of the applicants are 17-18 years old.  I guess when you're perceived as the "best" university every applicant who has any chance at admission is going to have near-perfect academic credentials but, JFC, what happened to letting kids enjoy their childhood?  I guess this explains why (with one singular exception), everyone I've ever met who went to Harvard is fucking weird.


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