In recent years, one focus of the debate over affirmative action has been its use in education, especially race-based admissions policies at universities. In a 2003 ruling involving the University of Michigan, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld a limited consideration of race in admissions to allow colleges to create a diverse student body. However, voters in Michigan have since passed an amendment to the state constitution that bans the use of affirmative...

The equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution provides that "No State shall ... deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws." Yet many state universities give preferences to members of certain races and groups when deciding whom to admit. In Regents of the University of California v. Bakke in 1978, the U.S. Supreme Court approved such preferences but only in specific circumstances...

When used as a factor in college admissions, affirmative action aims to foster diversity on campus and provide equal opportunities to people from certain minority groups. But is affirmative action achieving these goals and helping those it was designed to assist? Critics point to students struggling to keep up in schools mismatched to their abilities. But defenders claim that it is still necessary to ensure a diverse student body and combat the legacies...

"Race-based affirmative action had been declining as a factor in university admissions even before the recent spate of related cases arrived at the Supreme Court. Since Ward Connerly kickstarted a state-by-state political mobilization against affirmative action in the mid-1990s, the percentage of public four-year colleges that consider racial or ethnic status in admissions has fallen from 60 percent to 35 percent. Only 45 percent of private colleges...