Unsurprisingly, John of Discriminations is all over the soon-to-be-published study (available here) by Dr. Richard Sander (of UCLA Law School) that promotes the provocative idea that affirmative action for black law students may actually be disadvantageous to them. Dr. Sander thus explores an idea that's often bounced around my head - that affirmative action has the potential to do great harm by placing unprepared students in programs that are far too demanding. And I've always felt that AA programs were more for the benefit of the schools - who could pride themselves on their "diversity" - than for individual students, who were often admitted on merits that had nothing to do with academic potential.
So what does Dr. Sander have to say?
[John Rosenberg] According to an article in today's Chronicle of Higher Education, Prof. Sander conducted a systematic study of the bar passage rates of the 27,000 law students between 1991 and 1997. Among his findings:
* After the first year of law school, 51 percent of black students have grade-point averages that place them in the bottom tenth of their classes, compared with 5 percent of white students. "Evidence suggests that when you're doing that badly, you're learning less than if you were in the middle of a class" at a less-prestigious law school, Mr. Sander says.
* Among students who entered law school in 1991, about 80 percent of white students graduated and passed the bar on their first attempt, compared with just 45 percent of black students. In a race-blind admissions system, the number of black graduates passing the bar the first time would jump to 74 percent, he says, based on his statistical analysis of how higher grades in less competitive schools would result in higher bar scores. Black students are nearly six times as likely as whites not to pass state bar exams after multiple attempts.
* Ending affirmative action would increase the number of new black lawyers by 8.8 percent because students would attend law schools where they would struggle less and learn more, and earn higher grades...With the exception of the most-elite law schools, good grades matter more to employers than the law school's prestige.
As John notes, the unnamed critics so beloved by reporters are howling with anger over this departure from the politically-correct orthodoxy. John also notes that the articles criticizing Dr. Sander's work seem to be starting from the assumption that "social conservatives" who oppose AA do so only because they feel that whites are treated unfairly. Not only is this a bigoted and unwarranted assumption, but it misses Dr. Sander's point so completely as to suggest that these critics are wholly unfamiliar with his work, as well as with the reality of graduation rates for AA students. This type of reaction also suggests that AA has been removed from the realm of "interesting educational policy that might be useful" to a near-religious faith that must be defended against heretics at all cost.
The data are there. Take a look at the article for yourself, and check out the Volokh Conspiracy for Dr. Sander's guest blog posts. As with any study, the methodology of this one may be open to criticism, but to ignore the conclusions of this study by screaming "racist!" is to reveal oneself as unscientific and closed-minded - and unconcerned about the potential negative impact of AA to boot.
Posted by kswygert at November 14, 2004 04:47 PM