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University presentation sparks outrage over ‘Students of Color, minus Asian’ category

November 12, 2021 | | Print Article

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A graphic that was shown during a presentation at the University of Maryland Wednesday afternoon meant to demonstrate admission and enrollment states did not include Asian students in the “Students of Color” classification.

Presented by the university’s president, Darryll Pines during the school senate’s “State of the Campus” report, the graphic conveys freshman enrollment and admissions from the fall of 2017 through the fall of 2021. The graphic separated those admissions into two groups: “Students of Color, minus Asian,” and “White or Asian Students.”

“We’re at the point in the discourse when colleges have created the highly scientific and totally legitimate racial category of ‘Students of Color, minus Asian,'” noted critical race theory researcher and whistleblower Christopher Rufo in highlighting the graphic.

Fox News reported that a spokesperson for the university claimed that the graphic was meant to refer to “student populations that are considered underrepresented on our campus.”

“During his annual State of the Campus address, President Pines shared information about the demographics of the freshman class, including information about the diversity of the class. The data in this specific section of the slide refers to student populations that are considered underrepresented on our campus,” the spokesperson noted further, adding: “Asians are students of color.”

Steve Sin, an employee at the university, wrote in a tweet that the categorization brought up some unpleasant memories for him.

“What struck me about this slide first was the category, ‘Students of Color minus Asians,'” he wrote. “It hearkened back the memory when a US Navy recruiter, in 1990, told me that I did not qualify for its minority scholarship program because I am Asian, which the program considered as white.”

And Kenny Xu, author of “Inconvenient Minority” and president of Color Us United, told the network that institutions of higher education should not be utilizing “categories for color.”

“I don’t think the university should have categories for color at all. it’s ridiculous to say, ‘OK, we’re going to try to boost equity only for the minorities that we prefer,'” Xu told Fox News. “That is Blacks and Latinos.

“And then, of course, use that to exclude Asian-Americans and Whites from all sides. If it were up to me, we need to eliminate race for admissions, period. We need to eliminate racial categorization from the system. I don’t think it provides any of the right incentives,” he added.

In August 2020, the Justice Department ruled that Yale University had been discriminating against Asian and white student applicants.

“The Department of Justice today notified Yale University of its findings that Yale illegally discriminates against Asian American and white applicants in its undergraduate admissions process in violation of Title VI of the 1964 Civil Rights Act. The findings are the result of a two-year investigation in response to a complaint by Asian American groups concerning Yale’s conduct,” the DOJ noted at the time.

“There is no such thing as a nice form of race discrimination,” added Assistant Attorney General Eric Dreiband at the time.

Missy Halsey
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