Affirmative action made college attainable
In late 1973, I was a junior at Memorial High School.
The Edgewood Independent School District campus sat across from St. Mary’s University on Culebra Road.
We could see it, but it might as well have been on the other side of the planet.
For too many in my class, a college education would be unattainable.
Others never crossed the stage to receive a high school diploma.
Named in honor of those from the district who served and died in the nation’s wars — also too many — Memorial was under-resourced at every turn, a direct result of more than a century of discrimination that intentionally produced poverty, segregation and redlining, among other ills.
There were too few collegepreparatory classes offered, though standout teachers and administrators did what they could to make us more competitive.
I was one of the lucky ones, thanks to an affirmative action program, the kind that the U.S. Supreme Court ruled unconstitutional last week.
I’ve been upfront about being a product of affirmative action, even when snide comments followed.
Criticism about affirmative action, or the use of race as a consideration in admission, still rings hollow and hateful, especially coming from the six most politicized and far-right conservatives on the court.
That fall of ’73, a handsome, articulate student from the University of Pennsylvania came to Memorial High School to recruit student applicants to that prestigious Ivy League school.
I was among the students pulled from regular classes to meet Louis “Louie” Escareño, a Jefferson High School graduate who was a student recruiter and later an assistant director of admissions after graduating from Penn.
As a student recruiter, he traveled to San Antonio, El Paso and Los Angeles to visit schools with large Mexican American student populations. Penn’s affirmation action program was in its infancy, and Louie was among its first recruits.
At the time, Archbishop Patrick Flores helped support his recruitment efforts by contributing to his travel fund.
I still remember how he “sold” Penn. At the time, all I could think about was money and the lack thereof. My widowed mother was a school cafeteria lady struggling to pay off her mortgage. My younger brother was two years behind me.
Louie changed my perspective and worries.
“Don’t worry about money,” he said. “Worry about getting in.”
I believed him. I got in. I qualified for federal grants, work-study employment, university scholarships and, in my junior and senior year, loans I was able to repay, eventually, even on a modest newspaper salary.
I graduated in four years as a proud product of affirmation action.
The right-wing majority on the Supreme Court failed to see how such programs can work, how they benefit society and create more equity in a nation that’s struggling with its promise of democracy. Education aids that promise.
Race or ethnicity isn’t all that’s considered, even in the strongest of affirmative action programs.
Like other universities, Penn judged prospective students not only on their standardized test scores and grade point averages, but on their interests, achievements and potential.
Penn saw itself as having a duty to create a diverse microcosm of the country on its campus. You can’t do that with an all-white, all male student body.
Admission officers also knew that academic achievement doesn’t always equate to campus success.
Other admissions factors will become even more important as colleges and universities reset their admissions process. Using social class as a measure no doubt will come into play.
Already lawsuits are under way to challenge the admissions of “legacy” applicants, the children of alumni, and those of wealthy donors.
They represent the longestrunning, unchallenged admissions program in U.S. history.
As an admission official, Louie looked for the same quality in students whether he was in an elite college preparatory or a public school in East Los Angeles.
He was looking for exceptional students. He considered grade-point averages and standardized test scores alongside student stories, experiences, interests.
Ultimately, applicants were put in separate pools. Student athletes, for example, competed with others in the same pool. The best rose to the top.
He said the only category held in strict confidence contained legacy applicants and children of donors.
I was admitted because of affirmative action, but my race or ethnicity wasn’t all that was considered, he said.
As colleges and universities deal with a post-affirmative action reality, the former admissions official said, “To me, it’s not complicated.”
If admissions officials look at students as individuals — what each brings to create a diverse campus experience — then students will be better prepared to work in multicultural places like Texas, where Mexican Americans and other Latinos now make up the largest share of Texans and will continue to grow.
University admissions has never been solely about academic numbers.
Those numbers, in isolation, can be false measures. And as wrong as the six far-right conservatives now sitting on the Supreme Court.