It's déjà vu all over again

A white student has sued the state and the University of Texas at Austin, alleging that the university’s admissions policies and procedures discriminate against her in violation of the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution and federal civil rights laws. Abigail Noel Fisher, an 18-year-old senior at Stephen F. Austin High School in Sugar Land, filed Fisher v. State of Texas, et al. April 7 in the U.S. District Court for the Western District in Austin. Fisher alleges in her original complaint that UT-Austin rejected her application in a March 25 letter, even though she ranks in the top 12 percent of her high school class, scored 1,180 out of a possible 1,600 on the SAT college entrance exam and is an accomplished cellist. According to the complaint, Louisiana State University and Baylor University have offered Fisher scholarships based on her achievement, but UT-Austin encouraged her to enroll in other universities in the UT System. Fisher is asking U.S. Judge Sam Sparks to enjoin UT-Austin from using racially discriminatory policies. Fisher also is asking Sparks to require UT-Austin to admit her if she is qualified for admission under race-neutral criteria. Fisher’s complaint brings to mind the case that shook up higher education in Texas in the 1990s. In 1996’s Hopwood v. Texas, the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals prohibited the University of Texas School of Law from considering race as criteria for admissions. However, the U.S. Supreme Court held in 2003’s Grutter v. Bollinger that universities have a compelling interest in “student body diversity” and, under limited circumstances, may consider race or ethnicity as a factor for admissions. But, according to Grutter, government must narrowly tailor its policies when it pursues diversity. Fisher alleges in her complaint that UT-Austin’s race-based admissions policies are not narrowly tailored, because the university has failed to employ other means to achieve diversity. As noted in Fisher’s complaint, it’s unclear how much weight UT-Austin gives to an applicant’s race when considering whom to admit. But Fisher alleges in the complaint that “it is clear that UT-Austin grants to African-American and Hispanic students a substantial advantage in the admissions procedure that it does not grant to other students.” 
-- Mary Alice Robbins