To the Editor:
Re “On College Forms, a Question of Race, or Races, Can Perplex” (“Race Remixed” series, front page, June 14):
It is very, very sad that so many universities make admission decisions based on an applicant’s skin color and what country his or her ancestors came from. Our nation’s latest census tells us that we are increasingly a multiracial, multiethnic society—and, as the article notes, more and more individuals are themselves likely to be multiracial and multiethnic. In such a society, it is untenable for our institutions to be sorting people and treating some better and others worse, depending on which silly little box is checked.
As for the complaint that some students are “gaming” this system: The real problem is that the system itself is disgustingly discriminatory.
ROGER CLEGG
President and General Counsel
Center for Equal Opportunity
Falls Church, Va., June 14, 2011
To the Editor:
Fifty years ago, Congress and federal regulators redefined how the nation would deal with blatant and latent racism. Two generations have passed. Today, more minority families have succeeded in careers once closed to them because of inequities in higher education. We are a better nation, but also a different nation, and therefore we need an improved approach to the remaining inequities.
The solution is simple. Tailor affirmative action by making a family’s means the most important criterion. For example, why should the minority children of someone with the financial means of a Michael Jordan be given the same affirmative action weight as the average minority high school senior?
Many people fear that tinkering with the laws surrounding affirmative action would render the still needed corrections ineffective. I believe that we as a nation have moved beyond such silliness.
But if I am wrong and if legislators destroy a mandate that has improved this nation, we can turn to the courts yet again.
JOSEPH CONLIN
Fairfield, Conn., June 14, 2011
Keith Burgess-Jackson, J.D., Ph.D. 