Today, the Supreme Court today upheld the University of Texas at Austin’s (UT) consideration of race and ethnicity in college admissions. The ruling came in a case, Fisher v. University of Texas at Austin, about the admissions practices at the UT, but will likely affect admissions and financial aid policies in most institutes of higher education.
In a 4-3 decision, the court ruled that that the primary reason that the plaintiff in the case was denied admission to the university was not its consideration of race in admissions, but of Texas’ “10 percent plan.” The plan, as enacted by the Texas legislature, allows students within the top 10 percent of their high school graduating class to be admitted to the public college or university of their choice.
The university does have “a continuing obligation to satisfy the strict scrutiny burden: by periodically reassessing the admission program’s constitutionality, and efficacy, in light of the school’s experience and the data it has gathered since adopting its admissions plan, and by tailoring its approach to ensure that race plays no greater role than is necessary to meet its compelling interests.”