Affirmative Action In Higher Education In Texas

In society, there is usually some incidences where a particular group of individuals does not have the opportunity to access some of the privileges. Such minority groups may be based in different dimensions such as that of gender, race, religion, and social class, among other classifications. In such a case, the majority groups may take advantage of the minority and go against their rights or privileges, which they could otherwise get. From that, the affirmative action there comes in to support those minority parties or individuals. Therefore, affirmative action refers to that action of showing some favor to a group of individuals who seem to be the minority and even discriminated in the society by the other people. Color can also be another cause of such discrimination and which results in affirmative action to protect such individuals from discrimination and attempt to give them equal opportunities and representation. In that respect, any positive measure taken by the authorities or individuals in the attempt to the minorities as women, among other dimensions of minorities, can be termed as affirmative action (Ledesma pg. 227-228). 

Focusing on a short history concerning the concept of affirmative action, the idea came into existence during the era of reconstruction, which was put into action between 1863 and 1877. During this time, the slaves lacked both the skills as well as the resources which should assist them in their lives. As a result of this is when one individual, by name general William Tecumseh had a thought which seemed to be an affirmative action aimed at helping the slaves who were, in this case, the marginalized group.  He claimed that it was wise if the American government would undertake to divide the goods and land and offer it to the American families. But the proposal did not succeed as many people, including the American president by that time, did not what the request, which was Johnson. People anticipating rights to the marginalized groups did not give up, and as a result, they continued forming the movement anticipating for the civil rights to the citizens (Baker pg. 1861-1865). 

From the efforts of that individual, it led to the interpretation of the fourteenth amendments, which was focusing on the civil rights of African Americans. During the beginning of the amendments, the main focus was on the race. Still, later it expanded its focus and also incorporated the rights of the women as they discovered that women were also victims of the discrimination. As a result of the spread of the affirmative action, it has now entered into the learning institutions and more so the universities and colleges. There has been much scrutiny in the admissions to the universities as well as the colleges, where the leading cause of this is an overreliance on the cases of race in the attempt to attain diversity (Rose pg. 1-4). 

The government has taken different actions to show that it is in the race to fight for the rights of minorities in society through affirmative action. For example, the individual who was the American president by name Kennedy issued a directive to the entire contractor in the region to ensure that they offer equal opportunities to the job applicants who submitted their applications irrespective of their gender, race or origin among another dimension which they used to discriminate before. The civil rights act of 1964 also acted as a way of the government to end discrimination regarding the race, which was also affirmative action. The Act affected even the universities and colleges as it anticipated for the end of discrimination (Nguyen pg. 719-720). 

Later, when Obama became the president of the United States of America, the African Americas felt much relieved as they got a representative from their origin who would address their issues of discrimination, and which was a form of affirmative action. There was a significant impact on affirmative action to the institutions of higher learning, but it was not to the full capacity. This is because, as per some of the research findings, there was still discrimination in the universities and colleges as being from a particular race or ethnic group dictated the ability of an individual to be in such an institution. Obama did many actions to encourage the learning institutions to end such discriminations by offering some prizes to those performing well in this affirmative action. Fischer vs. The University of Texas' decision was one of the significant endorsements by the American government during Obama's era. It was mainly to encourage affirmative action. In respect to this, Obama offered a statement claiming that the universities should not, in any case, consider race in their admissions (Ledesma pg. 229-230). 

It is not Obama only who was anticipating from the affirmative action but also the current president, Donald Trump gave a statement claiming that race should not in any way dictated on the admission to the universities and colleges.  Those directives seemed to curb the Fisher vs. the University of Texas, which the Supreme Court had ruled. As a result, some allegations are going to the public that there were incidences of oppression and discriminations were the African Americas and the Africa Asians were the primary victims. A good example is a case where a court at the district level offered a decision that the Harvard system was not perfect. As a result, there is an appeal in the Supreme Court, and the predictions are that Harvard might lose and therefore invalidating its program. 

From statistics, there is a show that some of the universities over one hundred, which are explicitly located in Texas, have reported some cases of race consideration during the admission. Affirmative action has taken the extra mile where there are strict quotas as well as trick outreach. There are some of the laws and policies which Texas has put in place relating to affirmative action, whose focus is on the employment opportunities (Nguyen pg. 721-724). There was an incident that happens at the University of Texas, where an individual failed to be admitted to the university. As a result, he decided to go to the Supreme Court. The ruling of the court was a source of joy to the supporters of affirmative action. The introduction and full implementation of affirmative action would be a significant step in enhancing equality. 

In conclusion, the universities in Texas should style up and ensure that there are zero cases of race-based admission. Failure to do that there will be a higher probability of increasing the lack of equality in the institutions. The incorporation of all the races in the universities without discrimination of any kind will enhance success and unity among the students in those universities (Baker pg. 1866-1869). 

Work cited.

Nguyen, Bich-May. "Affirmative Action in the Trump Era." Family medicine 51.9 (2019): 719-721. 

Ledesma, María C. "California Sunset: O'Connor's Post-Affirmative Action Ideal Comes of Age in California." The Review of Higher Education 42.5 (2019): 227-254. 

Baker, Dominique J. "Pathways to racial equity in higher education: Modeling the antecedents of state affirmative action bans." American Educational Research Journal 56.5 (2019): 1861-1895. 

Rose, Deondra. "Policy Feedback and the Racialization of Affirmative Action, 1961-1980." International Journal of Public Administration (2019): 1-11. 

Lowinger, Robert Jay, et al. "Hmong Students’ Attitudes toward Affirmative Action." Journal of Student Affairs Research and Practice (2020): 1-13.