I'm not sure that you are at odds with your progressive friends on the specific point you make, which is that a change that affects specific practices in selective admissions in elite private and public universities is not very important for achieving more meaningful equity or fairness in the wider society.
I think you would be at odds with your progressive friends if you missed that this is only one piece of a massive judicial and legislative assault on every *other* policy, statute or campaign intended to secure racial, gender, and class equity and fairness. The critique of diversity here is not limited to a specific judgment that Harvard doesn't care about diversity enough; it's an argument that all claims about the value of pluralism, diversity, to institutions and communities in which defending that value is thought to require deliberate attention are valueless. SCOTUS is coming for all of it, and what they don't get, state legislatures and Republicans in Congress are going to do their best to target. The limited decision on the Voting Rights Act was a little hiccup this last term, and not a big deal considering that the Roberts Court already more or less undid the Voting Rights Act.
So yeah, this is not a big deal in terms of the specific impact on specific institutional practices. But seeing it in isolation is a big mistake.
Laura, that's a sensational article! You're absolutely right to identify the problem as beginning in the early grades. I had started writing this when you called. BTW, there's a great review-essay in the current Claremont Review of Books by Jesse Merriam that exposes some of the Ivy League manipulations on this score.
I'm not sure that you are at odds with your progressive friends on the specific point you make, which is that a change that affects specific practices in selective admissions in elite private and public universities is not very important for achieving more meaningful equity or fairness in the wider society.
I think you would be at odds with your progressive friends if you missed that this is only one piece of a massive judicial and legislative assault on every *other* policy, statute or campaign intended to secure racial, gender, and class equity and fairness. The critique of diversity here is not limited to a specific judgment that Harvard doesn't care about diversity enough; it's an argument that all claims about the value of pluralism, diversity, to institutions and communities in which defending that value is thought to require deliberate attention are valueless. SCOTUS is coming for all of it, and what they don't get, state legislatures and Republicans in Congress are going to do their best to target. The limited decision on the Voting Rights Act was a little hiccup this last term, and not a big deal considering that the Roberts Court already more or less undid the Voting Rights Act.
So yeah, this is not a big deal in terms of the specific impact on specific institutional practices. But seeing it in isolation is a big mistake.
Amen. How about universal pre-K or enhancing enrichment programs? Thx for shining a light on this.
Laura, that's a sensational article! You're absolutely right to identify the problem as beginning in the early grades. I had started writing this when you called. BTW, there's a great review-essay in the current Claremont Review of Books by Jesse Merriam that exposes some of the Ivy League manipulations on this score.