Description/Abstract
Affirmative action in higher education has become an active arena for policymaking and legal challenges in the United States. A question frequently raised about affirmative action is whether racial and ethnic minority students who benefit from affirmative action are successful in the academically demanding context of selective colleges. Using data from the Educational Longitudinal Study, the authors analyzed racial-ethnic differences in cumulative GPAs for White, Black, and Latino students who were high school seniors in 2004 and subsequently attended selective colleges and universities. Results show that Black and Latino students were more likely to graduate from selective colleges than White students who come from similar socioeconomic backgrounds with comparable academic resources and educational experiences.
Document Type
Policy Brief
Date
6-7-2023
Keywords
Affirmative Action, Higher Education, Education Policy
Language
English
Funder(s)
National Science Foundation
Funding ID
#1228207
Series
Policy Briefs Series
Acknowledgements
This research was supported by the National Science Foundation [Award #1228207]. We thank Seth Ovadia, Assistant Director of Institutional Research and Assessment at Syracuse University, for providing us with access to Academic Insights Data. We also thank Alyssa Kirk and Shannon Monnat for providing edits on a previous draft of this brief.
Disciplines
Public Affairs, Public Policy and Public Administration | Public Policy | Sociology
Recommended Citation
Lutz, A., Bennett, P., & Wang, R. (2023). Affirmative Action is a Successful Policy for Diversity in College Graduation. Syracuse University Center for Policy Research, Policy Brief Series. Brief #4. Accessed at: https://surface.syr.edu/cpr/473.
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
