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Volume CXXXII, Number 19 |
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The link from Bakke to Bowdoin
TODD BUELL
COLUMNIST
On Tuesday, the Supreme Court heard arguments in the cases of Grutter v. Bollinger and Gratz v. Bollinger. The cases are suits against the University of Michigan undergraduate college and law school by two white female plaintiffs. They claim that they were denied admission because of their race, in violation of the Equal Protection clause of the 14th amendment of the United States Constitution. A victory for the plaintiffs could overturn the Bakke* decision that currently serves as the standard in determining the legality of "affirmative action" in public university admissions.
A verdict in favor of the plaintiffs will obviously affect the way schools admit students. The court should tread carefully. It should not allow colleges to give unreasonable preferences to minority students. However, the court should protect the rights of colleges and universities to sculpt a class that has sundry perspectives without fear of legal reprisal. Bowdoin's recent attempt to diversify could serve as a model for the court.
The Bakke* decision, written by Justice Lewis Powell, proscribes "quotas," or the setting aside of a fixed number of spots for minority candidates. Powell did however allow for colleges to use race on the margins-as one of many factors beyond just merit that colleges could use in molding each incoming class. In his opinion, Powell quoted from a brief Harvard College submitted describing its admissions philosophy concerning diversity: "A farm boy from Idaho can bring something to Harvard College that a Bostonian cannot offer. Similarly, a black student can usually bring something that a white student cannot offer."
Here at Bowdoin, the college has engaged in an aggressive push to increase diversity over the last three years. At its inception, I was skeptical of the effort. I worried that the admissions office would only look to improve our "viewbook" image and thus would merely add students of color irrespective of their academic qualifications. However, three years into this process, I find that the campus now is a more vital, exciting, and dynamic place than it was when I arrived. I suspect that the two phenomena are not coincidental.
Statistics show that the number of students of color here has significantly increased in three years. However, that is only one tangible result of our diversity initiative. If improved statistics were the only benefit, then I would strongly champion overturning Bakke*. But here at Bowdoin diversity penetrates beyond skin color. In the time that I have been here, there has been a palpable increase in political activism. As a tour guide, I am proud to tell my tour groups, when they ask about the political atmosphere here, that a student of any political belief can find an active student group. This condition did not exist on the Bowdoin campus four years ago. When I arrived, the College Republicans hardly existed and I did not see any noticeable activity from either the College Democrats or the Democratic/Socialists. We were shamefully apathetic.
The increase in perspectives and opinions on campus is the most important form of diversity at any college. A liberal arts education should, as President Hyde said a century ago in the "Offer of the College," make us "at home in all lands and all ages." This purpose to our education cannot be fulfilled if we are not exposed to people of different viewpoints. This aim requires that we consider many elements in assembling a dynamic class every year. Race is, and should be, one of those elements.
The University of Michigan's size precludes it from treating each student holistically as Bowdoin does. Thus it will be hard for it to move away from its current practice of grading students on an institutional "point system." Yet it should attempt to personalize its admissions policy as best it can so that it, like Bowdoin, is able to realize that race matters but is not all that matters in admissions policy.
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