“It’s Pretty Essential”: A Critical Race Counter-Narrative of Faculty of Color Understandings of Diversity and Equity in Doctoral Admissions

Using a short story fiction counter-narrative, this critical race study examines how faculty of color within higher education and student affairs doctoral-granting programs bring critical epistemologies to their decision-making in the student admissions process and work to decolonize the academy despite neoliberal pressures. Faculty of color depart from current accounts of faculty decision-making in doctoral education in two key ways—by disregarding standardized measures of success and by considering diversity throughout the entire admissions process—leading us to important insights about how faculty of color differ from white faculty in their perception of and in their emphasis on diversity, equity, and justice in the admissions process. The implications are both broad and specific for creating dynamically diverse campus climates in an era of persistent challenges to affirmative action. The findings speak to the ways that those concerned with educational diversity and equity can support diversity and equity efforts in a neoliberal, color-blind environment. In a world defined by such policy and practice and a country that determines options and opportunity based on race, this study centers the voices of faculty of color in their institutions and analyzes how identity and institutional logics influence behavior.

     

From Vocational to Higher Education: An International Perspective

This paper explores the value of explaining contextual admissions policy directives through the conceptual lenses of meritocracy and social reproduction. It is suggested that examining these concepts can assist in highlighting some of the ideological and practical complexities associated with contextual admissions whilst providing opportunities to engage with wider debates concerning affirmative action in higher education policy.     

Entrepreneurship in Universities: Definitions, Practices, and Implications

Higher education today is faced with a perplexing array of often conflicting demands and pressures. There is continuing debate over a range of important concepts including educational quality, academic freedom, accountability, equity, affirmative action, and accessibility. These concepts reflect fundamental principles which form the basis for policy directions by governments and postsecondary education institutions. Yet, are we clear on what these principles mean and on how they interact? This discussion examines the various facets of the concept of entrepreneurship and the implications of entrepreneurial activities for higher education institutions. It is argued that basic differences exist in culture and values between higher education and the private sector, and that more attention to a clear understanding of the concepts and activities involved in entrepreneurship will reap benefits for higher education in future policy development and strategic planning.     

Exploring Access and Equity in Higher Education: Policy and Performance in a Comparative Perspective

A comparative analysis of how access and equity are defined and how policies have evolved reveals a number of commonalities and differences between countries. The overall trend is a movement from the priority given to ‘inherited merit’ in the admission process through a commitment to formal equality, towards the application of some modes of affirmative action for selected under‐represented groups. This overall convergence, which is accompanied by a growing appreciation of the complexity of social identities, is complemented by significant national specificity in respect of the social categories which are used to define social diversity. In the absence of appropriate comparative measures of participation a Higher Education Participation Index is developed to facilitate cross‐country comparisons. A review of current attempts to measure equity in access to higher education points to the need to develop a programme of comparative research which focuses on the social characteristics of students who are currently enrolled in higher education.     

美国肯定性行动计划与少数民族高等教育的发展

自20世纪60年代中期以来，肯定性行动计划通过特别招生计划、财政资助、补习教育、少数民族研究课程等措施，有力地促进了美国少数民族高等教育的发展。但近年来，肯定性行动计划在美国引发了激烈的争论，一些州甚至取消了肯定性行动计划，这很可能导致美国少数民族高等教育的严重倒退。     

An Exploratory Study of Undergraduates’ Attitudes Toward Affirmative Action Policies for Asian Americans in College

This exploratory study examined white undergraduate students’ (a) racial attitudes towards Asian Americans, (b) principled policy attitudes toward affirmative action, and (c) self-interest in relation to their support for college-based affirmative action policies for Asian Americans at a Midwestern university. A sample (n = 264, 28% male, 72% female) of white undergraduate students from a mid-sized public university in the Midwest was surveyed. The findings indicate that white undergraduate women have significantly more favorable principled policy attitudes toward affirmative action in general and for an affirmative action college policy for Asians, in particular, than do undergraduate males. Implications for issues of equity and social justice are shared.     

公平之困——二战后美国高等教育入学机会分配政策的历史变迁

教育公平是一个充满争议性的问题,它具有历史性和相对性,并随着利益关联者地位的变化而出现矛盾和冲突。本文以高等教育入学机会的分配为切入点,审视了二次世界大战后美国政府在高等教育普及化和民主化方面所做出的努力和尝试,分析了美国高等教育入学机会分配政策的历史变迁及其面临的问题和困境,并在此基础上,进一步阐释教育公平问题。     

Teaching managing diversity via feminist theory

This paper explores a project to design and mount a unit on ‘managing diversity’. For its conceptual framework the unit draws on feminist theories of struggles for equity and social justice and the various policy approaches that workplace equality agents have correspondingly developed. Despite the emphasis on feminist theory, the paper makes no attempt to compare gender equity initiatives with strategies for managing diversity. Rather, some of the tensions are identified between the culturalist aims of the Managing Diversity movement and the redistributive goals that generated affirmative action and equal employment opportunities strategies; and it is suggested how an analysis of those tensions may promote increased student understanding of the topic. Secondly, it is assessed how a unit may juxtapose industrial relations and human resource management concepts to the benefit of curricula in both.In planning a new unit, moreover, it is not only the content which needs to be considered, but also the students' prior learning experience and the politics of persuading one's colleagues of the proposal's worth. Thus an account of these more pragmatic issues is integrated into the discussion.     

高等教育机会公平:英国经验的启示

如何确保高等教育机会公平,尤其是如何确保弱势群体的高等教育机会,已经成为国际化的教育和政策问题,而这个问题随着高等教育规模的扩大又进一步被放大。通过研究英国高等教育扩张中的机会公平问题,本文总结到,大量的高等教育机会不公平是隐性的,是在基础教育以及中级教育阶段就已经形成的。因此,要改善高等教育中的机会公平,不能仅限于高等教育范畴的研究和改革。     

美国的语言教育政策：学校内外的争辩

语言教育政策是美国多元社会结构中重要的教育政策。美国双语教育法在实施 30年后 ,目前遭受严峻的挑战。《双语教育法》开始由《不让一个孩子掉队》、《语言获得法》替代。维护和反对双语教育政策的立法、研究和运动呈针锋相对的态势。语言教育政策在教育层面 ,人们关注它的是效率和机会均等的效果问题 ;在社会架构更深的层面 ,潜伏着国家的稳定性、语言文化权利的维护、美国社会的多元性和开放性等复杂的政治意涵。     

高等教育发展中的公平问题研究——以河南省高等教育发展为视角

教育公平作为分配社会公共资源的手段,是社会公平的重要基础,对实现社会公平意义重大。教育公平体现为机会公平、规则公平、结果公平及受教育者的发展公平。由于河南省高等教育资源有限,我国现行高等教育制度实施体制等方面的障碍,河南省的高等教育发展在资源分配、弱势主体受教育权保障等方面存在一定的公平问题。为此,我国应当通过完善高等教育体系、优化高等教育层次结构、健全现代大学制度等改革措施予以解决,从而保障河南省高等教育的公平发展,为中原经济区的快速发展提供人才支撑。     

The impact of Israel's class-based affirmative action policy on admission and academic outcomes

In the early to mid-2000s, four flagship Israeli selective universities introduced a voluntary need-blind and color-blind affirmative action policy for students from disadvantaged backgrounds. The program allowed departments to offer admission to academically borderline applicants who were above a certain threshold of disadvantage. We examine the effect of eligibility for affirmative action on admission and enrollment outcomes as well as on academic achievement using a regression discontinuity (RD) design. We show that students who were just barely eligible for this voluntary policy had a significantly higher probability of admission and enrollment, as compared to otherwise similar students. The affirmative action program also led to higher rates of admission to the most selective majors. Moreover, after enrollment, AA-eligible students are not falling behind academically, even at the most selective majors. Our results suggest the potential for a long-lasting impact of class-based preferences in admission on social and economic mobility.     

Affirmative action in Brazilian universities: Effects on the enrollment of targeted groups

This paper investigates how the adoption of affirmative action for college admission affected the enrollment of students from disadvantaged backgrounds in Brazil. We explore the time heterogeneity of policy adoption by universities to identify the policy impacts while accounting for contemporaneous confounding effects. Our study shows that the adoption of affirmative action increased the enrollment of students from groups explicitly targeted by each policy, particularly public high-school students and Blacks.¹ We also demonstrate that these effects were concentrated within more competitive and more prestigious academic programs. Lastly, we find that universities that adopted affirmative action policies with explicit racial criteria experienced an increase in the enrollment of Black students whereas universities that adopted race-neutral policies had no significant changes in the racial profile of their students. These results indicate that affirmative action policies were successful in improving access to higher education for targeted groups. However, we also identify important limitations of these policies.     

从高等教育入学机会的分配标准透视教育公平问题——对新中国50年普通高校招生政策的历史回顾

教育公平问题归根结底是一个权利、机会等资源的分配和再分配问题,其中分配标准是关键。不同的分配标准,决定了不同人群的现实处境。回顾新中国成立以来的高校招生政策,我国高等教育入学机会的分配标准经历了由新中国成立初期的学术和政治的双重标准,到教育“革命”时期政治标准被突出强调,“文革”后学术标准被重新确立,进而到当前经济实力成为影响机会分配的重要因素的变革历程。     

Access and equity in financing higher education: The case of Morocco

This paper explores the higher education financing policy in Morocco in light of the central issue of equity. First, it surveys the current situation, using a critical approach to the present financing policy, and looking at the three dimensions of adequacy, efficiency, and equity. Second, it describes the principal policy challenges in financing higher education. Third, it presents several public policy proposals likely to bring changes to the financing policy in order to meet these challenges. The analysis shows that the sustainability and the equity of the current financing system are undermined by the dysfunctions introduced by the private/public split in the higher education system and the lack of a clear political strategy pertaining to the medium of instruction.     

Admissions quotas in university education: Targeting and mismatch under Sri Lanka’s affirmative action policy

The state university system in Sri Lanka is characterised by free tuition, central administration and an affirmative action policy based on geographical region aimed at reducing inequality in access to higher education. Using administrative data on applicants for university admission, we study the effectiveness of the policy in targeting under-privileged regions and students and test for academic mismatch among medical students. We find that the policy ensures representation of disadvantaged regions while effectively targeting disadvantaged students. However, beneficiaries of the policy lag slightly behind the rest and this mismatch cannot be explained away by differences in university quality, though the estimated mismatch is likely to be an upper bound of mismatches occurring across the university system. These results suggest that region-based targeting is a viable alternative to the more common race/caste based affirmative action policies.     

Policy issues in the economics of higher education and related research opportunities in Britain and the United States

This paper considers several opportunities for research on the means of relating investment in higher education more closely to widely expressed desires for faster economic growth and for greater equity in educational opportunity. It does this against a background of policy issues related to growth and equity among income groups common to the current debates in the United States and Britain.Major basic policy trends in the U.S. are reviewed briefly first, with comparisons to some similar developments in Britain. These are then related to an underlying need for research to broaden the concept of human educational capital as a means of bringing findings closer to the needs of legislators' constituents and educational planners in democratic nations. Some preliminary evidence is included that suggests, for example, that not only expected monetary returns, but also expected nonmonetary returns reflecting the increasing value of time are important to students and their families as they decide to invest.The possibilities for research on means of aiding growth then are considered. They focus primarily on the opportunities inherent in early findings on relative rates of return to two year (e.g. Higher National Certificate, or junior college) programs, and the potential through adaptations in postsecondary education for speeding up application of basic science and new technology to production.Finally, research and preliminary findings on the regressive incidence of the net benefits of higher education among income groups is considered. It is suggested that there are some ways that higher education can contribute to faster economic growth while simultaneously contributing to equity.This paper was prepared while the author was Academic Visitor at the London School of Economics Higher Education Research Unit immediately following a semester spent as Guest Scholar at the Brookings Institution in Washington, D.C.     

Does educational privatisation promote social justice?

Social justice in education refers to the expectation that the education system provides fairness in its access to opportunities and results. Proponents of educational privatisation believe this would not only open up opportunities for those that otherwise are restricted from attending good schools, but that it would also improve overall efficiency in the education system through pressures of market competition. This article first provides a framework for analysing a quasi-market in education and for considering the potential effects of privatisation. It then applies this framework to the Netherlands, a school system premised completely on choice where two thirds of the schools are privately sponsored. We conclude that the Dutch system, thanks to a series of policies and regulations in place, performs relatively well on social justice, when looking at freedom of choice and overall productive efficiency. However, for equity and social cohesion, despite clear policy efforts, the privatised system seems to undermine social justice for certain groups in the population. The dilemma observed here is that some private benefits of education must be compromised to achieve greater equity and social cohesion. It is an open question whether policy makers are willing to make such tradeoffs.     

Taking Race into Account: Charting Student Attitudes Towards Affirmative Action

This paper examines student attitudes towards affirmative action over 4 years of college. Asian American and Latino/a students were more likely than White students to disagree strongly or somewhat with abolishing affirmative action after 4 years of college. A student’s attitude towards the policy as a first-year student, peer group influence, and political orientation were significant predictors of student attitudes of affirmative action during the fourth year of college. The findings suggest that while college plays some role in shaping affirmative action attitudes, its influence is somewhat limited in comparison to the background traits and attitudes that students bring to college.     

Affirmative Action for Gender Justice in South African and Kenyan Education Systems

Abstract

Since women struggled to access higher education during the colonial era, tackling gender imbalances post-independence became a major focus for Kenya and South Africa. The aim of this article is to demonstrate that affirmative action has not guaranteed gender equity in South African and Kenyan higher education systems. the author argues that, although higher education is generally available to all in both countries, women still struggle with access and “success”. This is besides the existence of post-independence higher education policies and parallel gender frameworks meant to bolster women’s access. The article uses a critical and thematic exploration of secondary literature, theory and data. The article contends that the unresolved gap between policies and the reality of the lived experiences of women exacerbates inequalities. It is suggested that both countries refocus and recalibrate existing policies and remedial action measures in order to ensure that academically deserving women are able to access and participate meaningfully in higher education.