Rejected by Harvard, Indian Americans Fight Affirmative Action in Supreme Court

‘Many Indian Americans’ are part of anti-affirmation group SFFA which has filed a lawsuit against Harvard in SCOTUS

SFFA has filed lawsuits against Harvard University and the University of North Carolina, arguments in both of which will be heard by the US Supreme Court starting 31 October.

Vibhushita Singh/The Quint

“I had perfect grades in high school and perfect test scores, that couldn’t have been the reason why I was rejected by Harvard,” Vikas (name changed to protect identity) shares his experience from high school days when he was applying for college admissions.

Like Vikas, numerous other academically high performing Asian Americans resent rejections from prestigious American universities, especially Harvard.

The sought-after educational institution is now fighting a lawsuit in the US Supreme Court to defend its admission criteria, brought on by SFFA – Students for Fair Admissions – an anti-affirmation action group of students, including ‘many Indian Americans’ who believe they were ‘wrongly’ rejected by the university.

SFFA has also filed a similar lawsuit against the University of North Carolina, arguments in both of which will be heard by the court starting 31 October.

SFFA claims that the university uses subjective standard to weigh certain personality traits including likability, courage and kindness, creating a discriminatory block for them.

Harvard University maintains that its admission programmes take account of race to foster educational diversity which is not illegal as per a decades old precedent set by the Supreme Court.

In previous decisions, the court ruled that racial quotas are unconstitutional, but race can be used as a factor in admissions to attain a diverse student body provided it isn’t the conclusive one.

‘Different Standards’

Now a post-graduate student, Vikas explains why he is part of SFFA’s lawsuit, “They reject a lot of people who are good. Maybe they were not impressed by my essay or extra co-curriculars, but the problem I have with them is that they hold people to different standards. It is more difficult to get in if you are Asian American than White, White than Hispanic, Hispanic than African American.”

SFFA’s Founder Edward Blum, a legal entrepreneur who has brought several lawsuits including against race-conscious admission policies, claims that most competitive US colleges use race-based affirmative action.

“SFFA’s expert in the Harvard litigation presented to the courts a hypothetical case of an Asian-American male with a 25 percent chance of admission. Changing the applicant’s race to white would increase his admissions chances to 36 percent, leaving all other factors constant. Changing this applicant’s race to Hispanic boosts his chances to 77 percent, while changing to African American would boost his chance of admission to 95 percent.”

Edward Blum, Founder, SFFA

SFFA claims that it has about 22,000 members, including many Indian Americans who were not accepted into elite colleges.

“It is unknown how many rejected students are Indian American, but my experience suggests quite a lot.”

Edward Blum

SFFA lost their seven years long contentious lawsuits against race-conscious admission programmes at Harvard and University of North Carolina in federal trial courts, after which they approached the US Supreme Court.

“The Supreme Court takes only 1% of the cases it is petitioned to take. It’s possible that the newer justices with the court feel that there is something wrong about Harvard practices.”

Vikas (name changed)

Vikas had attended a deposition as part of the earlier hearings where he was questioned by lawyers representing Harvard.

The university calls the lawsuit a “threat to educational opportunity for millions of young people.” 

“If the lawsuit against Harvard succeeds, it would diminish students’ opportunities to live and learn in a diverse campus environment - denying them the kind of experiences that are central to Harvard’s educational mission and critical for success in our diverse society.”

Harvard University

‘Admission Not a Validation of Meritocracy’

Affirmative action finds a divided America, including Asian Americans on both sides. “I have a lot of empathy for young people who worked hard and wished to go to their dream college. But it is important to keep in mind that Harvard’s admit rate is less than one on twenty,” says Sociologist Dr Natasha Warikoo, a Professor at Tufts University and the author of Is Affirmative Action Fair. “Nobody gets into Harvard!” 

“You are not going to apply to Harvard if you are not a strong student. Most face disappointment,” adding, “But they will probably get into a similar college and thrive, as strong students coming from strong educational backgrounds often do. The idea that Harvard is the only place is problematic.”

Natasha Warikoo

The Indian American sociologist with expertise in racial and ethnic inequality in education says the admissions process works to create ‘best possible campuses’ for learning.

“For instance, their baseball team needs a first base player because a player graduated. They will recruit a student with good grades who can fit that role. Then they look at not only those interested in STEM but also for ones interested in humanities. Therefore, what we can ask – is it fair or not that they take students of alumni parents? Then, there are legacy students whose families made a substantial contribution to the college " she says.

"All these things go into admissions. It isn't about how much you deserve it over someone else," Warikoo adds.

“We need to stop thinking about it as a validation of meritocracy,” she asserts.  

Asian American students, especially second-generation Indian Americans, find it 'hypocritical in a country which values meritocracy above all else.'

Racial preferences in American higher education started getting enacted in the 1970s. Supporters of affirmative action wish that universities continue their efforts towards integration by creating diverse student bodies, to undo the effects of years of racial segregation and White supremacy.

Race continues to play a role in American society as reflected in wealth disparity – the ‘median wealth of White Americans is 10 times that of African Americans’.

Warikoo says the history of affirmative action is including students who were segregated and excluded from these colleges.

"African Americans live in poorer neighbourhoods, even those with the same income as White Americans. In most cases we see that a Black child is only one generation out of poverty compared to a White child, parents’ qualifications being similar. There are reasons race and class have ongoing impact.”

Natasha Warikoo

Liberal supporters of diversity and inclusion like Shefali (name changed), a graduate student at University of Pennsylvania, is against affirmative action in college admissions because of the way it plays out for individual students.

“What we are doing is the opposite of diversity. We are harming minorities by not looking at their merit. We can’t look at someone's race and accept them because of that. We must integrate but not racialize – that is counterproductive.”

Shefali (name changed), Indian American student

Growing up, Shefali says she always noticed that high school and college brochures carried ‘super diverse’ pictures.

“Representation matters, but no one wants to be just a token based on how they look. A lot of times one hears about people on the campus - 'Oh you know what they were looking for, numbers need to be balanced' - I would never want to be a token or ever be selected or hired because I am a woman or because of my race,” she says.

Lack of Popular Support

Race based selections in college admissions have been around for 50 years, but they don’t have popular support.

A 2019 Pew survey showed that 73 percent of Americans believe universities should not consider race or ethnicity in admission decisions.

In the 2020 election, voters in liberal and diverse California, continued to support a state ban on consideration of race, ethnicity, and gender in public higher education and government jobs. 

The US Supreme Court last discussed the issue in 2016 in a case against the University of Texas and upheld the affirmative action programme.

Since then, the Supreme Court has become much more conservative, given the appointment of conservative justices by former US President Donald Trump. 

If the conservative majority in the Supreme Court were to rule to end race conscious college admissions, it will radically shift the admissions landscape, impacting students of all races, altering American institutions of higher learning for a long time to come.

(Savita Patel is a San Francisco Bay Area-based journalist and producer. She reports on Indian diaspora, India-US ties, geopolitics, technology, public health, and environment. She tweets at @SsavitaPatel)