Top Colleges Take More Blacks, but Which Ones?
New York Times article titled "Top Colleges Take More Blacks, but Which Ones?" published on June 24, 2004 by Sara Rimer and Karen W. Arenson.
Key insights from the article:
While top colleges like Harvard had increased Black student enrollment, a large proportion were West Indian or African immigrants or their children, rather than descendants of American slavery.
Professors Henry Louis Gates Jr. and Lani Guinier raised concerns that native-born African Americans—those whose families have been in the U.S. for generations—were being underrepresented.
The article questioned whether affirmative action was truly benefiting the group it was originally intended to help: Black Americans disadvantaged by centuries of systemic racism.
Researchers at Princeton and Penn found that 41% of Black students at selective colleges identified as immigrants, children of immigrants, or mixed race—far higher than their proportion in the general Black population.
“We need to learn what the immigrants’ kids have so we can bottle it and sell it.”