A divided U.S. Supreme Court sent two messages on affirmative action this morning: It struck down the University of Michigan’s method of using race in undergraduate admissions, but upheld the Michigan law school’s differing admissions approach. While the court’s 6-3 majority in the undergraduate case agreed with the university’s position that racial and ethnic diversity is a worthy educational goal, it said the point system used to weigh undergraduate applications amounted to a quota system. The vote upholding the law school’s more subjective use of race in admissions was 5-4.
More Education Week coverage—and links to the decisions—will follow on the Web later today and in the next print edition, dated July 9.
