San Antonio Express-News (Sunday)
Several law schools alter admissions
High court ruling on race has many fearing disruption
The U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to overturn race-conscious admissions at universities will alter practices at half of
Texas’ law schools, a change many legal professionals fear could disrupt a diverse pipeline into law firms and the judiciary.
Law schools were among the heaviest users of affirmative action in the state, outpacing Texas’ undergraduate and medical school admissions. University of Houston Law Center, Texas Southern University’s Thurgood Marshall School of Law, Baylor Law, Southern Methodist University’s
Dedman School of Law and University of North Texas Dallas College of Law employed such policies and now will have to seek alternate means of diversifying their classes — and transferring that diversity into the workforce.
“Some advance planning has occurred, but at the same time, everybody is … asking themselves the same questions,” said Stephen M. Griffin, W.R. Irby
Chair and Rutledge C. Clement Jr. professor in constitutional law at Tulane University. “What does this mean for employment, not just the efforts to diversify the law schools?”
Stemming from a generally accepted recognition that the legal profession should reflect the population it serves, law programs already face hurdles to accreditation when their students and faculty are not considered diverse enough.
Texas’ overall population is 40 percent Latino, 40 percent white, 13 percent Black and 6 percent Asian, according to the most recent data from the U.S. Census Bureau. (The younger population is even more diverse.) But white lawyers make up 77 percent of the Texas Bar, and white law students are consistently overrepresented in
most schools across the state, regardless of whether they used race-conscious admissions.
Texas attorney Debra Baker, who advocates for gender and racial diversity in her field, called the issue paramount. The racial and ethnic makeup of the bar can provide attorneys with broader perspectives in how they address diversity in their areas of practice, including addressing diverse juries that they may encounter in their cases, as well as the way they interact with clients, she said.
Diversity in law schools is also helpful in exposing students to diversity of thought that they will benefit from later, Baker said.
“If you don’t have exposure to diverse types of people, it’s hard for you to represent your clients fully,” she said.
Many civil rights advocates worry that the end of affirmative action could mean lower numbers of minorities in competitive schools. Others have likened diversity to a national security issue, especially in medical and law schools that rely heavily on creating diverse doctors and lawyers to serve diverse communities.
(Using race as a factor in health science schools is apparently less common in Texas, with Hearst Newspapers finding only several of UTHealth Houston’s programs, including McGovern Medical School, having considered race as a factor prior to the ruling. Another eight schools with medical programs said they did not use race-conscious admissions, while a handful did not respond to requests for comment.)
Alvin B. Tillery Jr., a professor of political science at Northwestern University, said the legal workforce likely will struggle if law schools become increasingly out-of-touch with a population that is expected to become even more diverse than it is now.
“If you’re not welcoming to minority talent, then your profession is not going to have much success when we get past the demographic cliff,” said Tillery, who is also director of the university’s Center for the Study of Diversity and Democracy.
Several students at UH Law said they were frustrated with the Supreme Court’s decision, which determined that University of North Carolina’s and Harvard University’s use of race as one factor in holistic admissions processes discriminates against Asian American students in violation of the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment. While UH Law is one of the more diverse law schools in Texas, they worried what the future might look like in their program and profession.
Four of Texas’ law schools confirmed they held race-conscious admissions policies but would no longer be using them after the court’s decision. (Hearst Newspapers confirmed the past use of race as a factor at UNT Dallas Law through its admissions website, although officials did not respond to requests for comment.)
UH leaders said in a statement that diversity will continue to be a priority.
“We embrace and appreciate the diversity within our student body, recognizing the numerous academic, social and community benefits that arise from having a campus enriched with individuals from different backgrounds,” the statement reads. “UH is dedicated to offering educational opportunities to students from a wide range of backgrounds and has successfully done so without employing race and ethnicity as a determining factor. We are committed to maintaining these practices in compliance with state and federal laws.”
Thurgood Marshall School of Law previously had considered race as a “minor” factor in its holistic review of applicants, officials said in a statement. The most diverse law school in Texas — created in response to a 1946 lawsuit fighting Black students’ exclusion from UT Law — counts almost 90 percent students of color and enrolls the most Black students of any law school in the state.
“To that end, TMSL has remained one of the top producers of minority attorneys in the state and in the nation, as has been the reality since its inception. In light of the Supreme Court decision, TMSL is currently engaged in reevaluating the admissions process to ensure compliance with the ruling,” a statement reads.
Five law schools did not consider race as a factor in admissions prior to the Supreme Court’s decision, and the results also were mixed. University of Texas Law, the state’s topranked program, was 62 percent white in 2022, but St. Mary’s School of Law in San Antonio was 41 percent white.
Experts predict that schools that used affirmative action will turn more heavily to strategies that some of their peers have used to assess a student’s circumstances outside of race. UT Law considers disability, socioeconomic disadvantage and first-generation college-student status as well as personal experiences with discrimination, according to the school’s website. (Universities also will remain able to consider applicants’ own discussion of race and how it has affected them in their admissions essays, even if admissions departments cannot use race as a factor in itself ).
American Bar Association officials have found a diversified workforce an issue important enough to hinge upon law schools’ accreditation requirements. Baylor Law is in remediation after it was found not to be in compliance with the group’s “diverse and inclusive” requirement for part-time faculty.
Houston Bar Association President Diana Gomez said her organization also is committed to representing attorneys from all backgrounds — and with the end of affirmative action, recruiting efforts will become even more important than they already are, she said.
“We must double down on our continuing efforts to help our Houston area law schools build their pipeline programs — to expose greater numbers of high school and college students within Houston’s diverse community to the potential for a career in law,” Gomez said.
Michael F. Barry, president and dean at South Texas College of Law, said he believes word-ofmouth is crucial. His school did not use race-conscious admissions, but he said it has still become more diverse through intentional efforts to create welcoming environments for minority students — leading many to apply through referrals from students who came before them.
Barry said even though his school won’t be directly affected by the decision, he fears that aspiring lawyers might be deterred from entering the profession. Law schools around the country will need to be more proactive, he said.
“There were reports after the opinion came out that students from diverse backgrounds felt discouraged and wondered whether they should apply to colleges and law schools,” Barry said. “There will need to be an encouragement from members of the profession that students from diverse backgrounds should indeed consider higher education.”