Two federal lawsuits filed against Harvard University and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill claim affirmative action should be banned from the schools in what is shaping up to be another nation-wide debate on whether or not race should be considered during the college admissions process.
The lawsuits filed Monday by a group of recently rejected applicants argue that both universities' race-based admissions policies are applied at the expense of qualified white and Asian American students, the Associated Press reported.
Furthermore, Harvard is accused of practicing "racial balancing" year after year by accepting "essentially the same percentage" of blacks, whites, Hispanics and Asian Americans- even though the number of applicants and qualifications for each group have changed, the lawsuit claims according to the AP.
"Harvard's remarkably stable admissions and enrollment figures over time are the deliberate result of system wide intentional racial discrimination designed to achieve a predetermined racial balance of its student body," reads the lawsuit that lists as a plaintiff the nonprofit Students for Fair Admissions, comprised of rejected applicants, parents and interested students.
Harvard and UNC-Chapel Hill, however, stood by their policies, pointing out their admissions process is legal under federal law.
"(T)he university continues to affirm the educational benefits diversity brings to students, as well as the importance of preparing students for a diverse society and assuring a pool of strong state leaders by admitting undergraduates from every background," Rick White, spokesman for UNC-Chapel Hill, told the AP.
Harvard University cited the landmark 1978 U.S. Supreme Court decision that upheld affirmative action in Regents of University of California v. Bakke. The Supreme Court even mentioned the Ivy League school's admissions process as a "legally sound approach."
"Then and now, the college considers each applicant through an individualized, holistic review having the goal of creating a vibrant academic community that exposes students to a wide-range of differences: background, ideas, experiences, talents and aspirations," Robert Iuliano, Harvard General Counsel, said according to the AP.
Affirmative action has come under legal scrutiny in recent years, with rejected students, many of them white, filing lawsuits against the policy, first installed to ensure students society may discriminate against get a fair shot at entering college. In some cases, the policy is struck down.
In April, the Supreme Court upheld Michigan's ban on affirmative action that state voters passed in 2006 with a constitutional amendment.
