Enhancing Equity in Higher Education without Demographic Based Affirmative Action

Boaz Shulruf University of Auckland

What is it about?
Equity in higher education is one of the major challenges that higher education institutions and policy makers face today. The need to enhance equity in higher education raises difficult ethical dilemmas, for example: How equitable are affirmative admission policies if they are based on ethnicity or race? Does the enrolment and participation of students, who do not meet the entry criteria of academic programmes, compromise the quality of these programmes? The literature on these issues is inconclusive and highlights the need to re-assess the current paradigms.

This session will introduce and discuss the implications derived from the “Dual Admission Model” (Shulruf, Turner, & Hattie, 2009) which demonstrates how equity could be enhanced in higher education without the need to apply any affirmative action.

Why is it important?

Higher education institutions and other policy makers have mostly addressed inequality in higher education by changing admission policies. Hence, a range of admission policies have been implemented aimed at increasing the number of students from traditionally under-represented populations in higher education (Rigol, 2003; Skilbeck & Connell, 2000). Among these, the most popular admission strategies are open admission policies  (Friedlander, 2008; Schmid, 2008) and ethnicity based ‘affirmative action’ policies  (Bucks, 2005; Donnelly, 1998; Tienda, Alon, & Niu, 2008). Nonetheless, these admission policies attract criticism from two fronts. The first is legal; in California, the High Court has abolished any affirmative action in admissions to higher education arguing that it is unconstitutional (Mohr, Bourgeois, & Duquenne, 2004). Secondly, other critics argue that enabling students to enrol in higher education, based on socio-demographic criteria rather than on their secondary school achievements, would increase the number of students who fail and thus damage the quality of education  (Deaton & Schutz, 2001).

How the session will be run?

·       A brief review of admission policies used around the world

·      A discussion on advantages and disadvantages of these policies

·      An introduction of the “Dual Admission Model”

·      A discussion on the “Dual Admission Model” and the implications for higher education institutes, students and secondary schools.

References

Bucks, B. (2005). Affirmative Access Versus Affirmative Action: How Have Texas' Race-Blind Policies Affected College Outcomes? Dallas: The University of Taxas at Dallas.

Deaton, R., & Schutz, G. J. (2001). Examining the Predictive Power of the ACT and High School GPA. Florida: Tennessee Higher Education Commission, Southern Association of Institutional Research.

Donnelly, N. (1998). Berkeley Weighs Its Options for Preserving Student Diversity. The Journal of Blacks in Higher Education,, 19, 29-32.

Friedlander, J. (2008, 3-5 June). From Open Admissions to the Honors College: Equal Opportunities at the City University of New York. Paper presented at the Hurst Seminar on Higher Education and Equality of Opportunity: Cross-National Perspectives, Ben Gurion University of the Negev, Beer Sheva, Israel.

Mohr, J. W., Bourgeois, M., & Duquenne, V. (2004). The Logic of Opportunity: A Formal Analysis of The University of California's Outreach and Diversity Discourse. Santa Barbara: University of California.

Rigol, G. W. (2003). Admissions Decision Making Models, How U.S. Institutions of Higher Education Select Undergraduate Students. New York: The College Board.

Schmid, C. (2008, 3-5 June). Challenges and Opportunities of Community Colleges. Paper presented at the Hurst Seminar on Higher Education and Equality of Opportunity: Cross-National Perspectives, Ben Gurion University of the Negev, Beer Sheva, Israel.

Shulruf, B., Turner, R., & Hattie, J. (2009). A Dual admission model for equity in higher education: a multi-cohort longitudinal study. Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences, 1(1), 2416-2420.

Skilbeck, M., & Connell, H. (2000). Access and Equity in Higher Education An International Perspective On Issues and Strategies. Dublin: The Higher Education Authority.

Tienda, M., Alon, S., & Niu, S. (2008, 3-5 June). Affirmative Action and the Texas Top 10% Percent Admission Law: Balancing Equity and Access to Higher Education. Paper presented at the Hurst Seminar on Higher Education and Equality of Opportunity: Cross-National Perspectives, Ben Gurion University of the Negev, Beer Sheva, Israel.