June 21, 2006

State Bans on Affirmative Action Have Been of Little benefit to Asian-American Students, Report Says

Frank H. Wu, Wayne State University's Law School dean, commented about a Michigan Journal of Race & Law story which questions a 2005 study done by Princeton University. The study predicted that four out of every five seats created by accepting fewer African Americans and Hispanic students would be filled by Asian Pacific Americans at the elite schools, based on an analysis of enrollment data from law schools at the University of Washington, the University of Texas and the University of California's Berkeley, Davis and Los Angeles campuses from 1993 to 2005. Asian Pacific Americans made up 12.9 percent of the enrollments at the five law schools with Affirmative Action in effect, and 14.3 percent without, which is a less significant increase than the Princeton study had predicted. "The study is important because what typically happens is that Asian Pacific Americans are excluded from the civil rights dialogue, and then are suddenly introduced as spoilers in the affirmative action debate," Wu said. "The better approach is to oppose bias against Asian Pacific Americans even as we encourage inclusion of African Americans and Latinos."

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