Fairness in college admissions in the real world
-Commentary by Roger Hernandez

"Does that mean the only way to broaden participation in higher education is to go back to the days when it was OK to patronize certain ethnic groups? No.

Consider what is happening at Texas A&M University. The school says that it does not take ethnicity into account in admissions, yet recently said that, compared with last year, black enrollment will be up 57 percent and Hispanic enrollment 24 percent.

How did the school do that? Texas A&M conducted an aggressive recruitment campaign in poor neighborhoods and gave $8 million in scholarships to students who were the first generation in their families to go to college. A similar initiative, Gov. Jeb Bush's four-year-old "One Florida" program, bans consideration of ethnicity in admissions but steps up recruitment in poor neighborhoods and provides free SAT preparation for low-income students. Black enrollment in Florida's state college and university system went from 14 percent in 1998 to 15.7 percent for 2003-2004, and Hispanic enrollment increased from 13.8 percent to 16 percent.

Both states also have "percentage" plans. After a federal court outlawed use of ethnicity in admissions in 1998, Texas decided to guarantee that the top 10 percent of graduates from each high school will get into one of the state schools; Florida guarantees admission to the top 20 percent."