Share to twitterA federal judge ruled in favor of Harvard in a discrimination suit brought by Asian American applicants.On Tuesday a federal judge ruled against a group of Asian American students who claimed that Harvard discriminated against them in their admissions policy. The. There is no question that Asian American students face a disadvantage in gaining admission to Harvard. The question is why and whether Harvard is responsible for it.
However, the Judge also held that the plaintiffs could not prove that the lower personal ratings are the result of “animus” or ill-motivated racial hostility towards Asian Americans by Harvard admissions officials. It is disappointing that a federal judge would indulge in that sort of conjecture. Surely the burden should be on Harvard to prove that its lower evaluation of the personal characteristics of Asian Americans isthe result of racial bias rather than vice versa. The court must be aware of various stereotypes of Asian Americans as “grinds” and math geeks who lack personality. The burden should be on Harvard to prove that such stereotypes are not at play here.
The court’s second explanation for the racial “personal rating” gap is that there is racial bias in the evaluations by teachers and counselors. The judge wrote: “teacher and guidance counselor recommendations seemingly presented Asian Americans as having less favorable personal characteristics than similarly situated non-Asian American applicants . . .