Dayana Lara Blog # 2

Affirmative action plan as stated in the readings is not only challenging but controversial. According to the readings Affirmative action plan was design to help less represented minorities, “Affirmative action is more of a process than just an admissions policy. Colleges and universities reach out to groups that are underrepresented and urge students to apply. Institutions often offer financial aid to underrepresented students and provide on-campus support programs to improve their academic success.” In the article The Supreme Court and Affirmative Action, adds on to say that the policy permitted schools to use two forms of admissions. One, regular admission, which compared all scores and grades among White students. Second, special admission, students were allowed to apply as “economically and or educationally disadvantaged” and were not ranked against White students but instead with others of similar disadvantaged students. Unfortunately after the 1978 Bakke case that ruled out the affirmative action policy a decrease in admissions at Universities was seen by African American students and Latinos. It’s very hard to add comment to such controversial topic but I instead can agree with President Lyndon Johnson who acknowledges that, “You do not take a person who, for years, has been hobbled by chains and liberate him, bring him up to the starting line of a race and then say you are free to compete with all the others, and still just believe that you have been completely fair.” In making this comment, President Lyndon Johnson argues that it’s not fair to conclude that les disadvantaged students are able to compete with students who have exposure to more knowledge and better education. I agree that minorities do face many educational disadvantages because of my participation as a minority I faced many struggles that prevented me from taking classes with regular students that were native English speakers. I struggled with English classes simply because I had never been exposed to vocabulary that was necessary to successfully accomplish Standard English classes. If I were a student that was looking for an opportunity at a respect Medical Universities, I would hope to be ranked with other minorities instead of highly educated students. Not because I’m less intelligent but simply because my struggles and my exposure to lower educated environments.