Even The New York Times Is Questioning Diversity, Equity And Inclusion

The editors of the New York Times just called on the University of California to bring back standardized tests. Here's why it matters.

It all comes down to this.

When people of any race and gender (real or imagined) get sick, they want to see a good doctor. Not a mediocre doctor who got into medical school because of an immutable or irrelevant characteristic (i.e., race, LGBTQ+ status, citizenship, etc.). We want a doctor who is smart, knowledgeable, and highly competent.

But getting the best doctor is no longer the goal of American medical schools. Instead, the focus today is to recruit a first-year class of students who reflect America’s demographic diversity, not students who have demonstrated superior intellectual merit.

So it is significant that on Monday, a major pillar of the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) industry — the New York Times — criticized the University of California (UC) system for abandoning standardized test scores in college admissions.

Standardized tests have long been a whipping boy for DEI advocates, who argued that they discriminate against Black students. In 2020, UC ignored a recommendation by its own Academic Senate and dumped the SAT and ACT standardized tests. UC now makes college admission decisions based on high school grades.

Grades obviously are highly variable and depend on the school district. A top graduate of an inner-city high school might be a middling student (or worse) at a well-funded public or private high school. Grade inflation is epidemic in low-performing high schools; after all, someone has to be the valedictorian.

The NYT editorial points to several worrisome educational trends (e.g., artificial intelligence) but notes that “the declines in preparedness among University of California students are larger than the regression elsewhere, which underscores the role of the test-blind policy.”

The NYT wrote that UC, a world class research institution, has essentially randomized aspects of its admissions process by “admitting unprepared students while rejecting many who could thrive there.”

In recent months, the chairs of more than 60 departments have signed a letter asking UC to reinstate admission testing requirements, and more than 700 humanities and social sciences professors have signed a similar letter. They complain that many incoming UC students struggle to read and do basic math.

An English professor said she got students who could not write a simple sentence after the SAT was dropped. More than half of entering Berkeley students who took a math placement test incorrectly answered basic questions (such as solving for x in x²> 4).

The letter from UC faculty in the STEM departments (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) states: “The SAT/ACT mathematics requirement is not an obstacle to equity; rather, it is a prerequisite for it. Failing to measure preparation gaps does not remove barriers; it moves them into the classroom, where they become harder to overcome. An admissions process that ignores foundational readiness does a disservice to the most vulnerable students.”

UC’s response to the concerns of its frontline workers - department chairs and professors - was to form a committee to study the problem.

Medical Schools

Heather Mac Donald, a fellow at the Manhattan Institute, has written extensively about the consequences of educational institutions rejecting merit-based admissions for years. She states that medicine is being “corrupted” to achieve demographic quotas in medical schools.

In 2022, Mac Donald wrote that the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) lowered academic bars to bolster the admission of Black and Hispanic students. The first major licensing test for medical students measures their knowledge of biochemistry, physiology, cell biology, pharmacology, and the cardiovascular system. Because minority students got low scores, Mac Donald wrote, they were previously passed over for prestigious internships and grants. She said the AAMC converted the barometer of test passage from a numerical score to a “Pass/Fail” system and altered the test to include non-science components such as “communication and interpersonal skills.”

Still, Mac Donald wrote, “the standard deviation in scores has persisted,” resulting in a new focus on racism in the faculty and anti-racism education.

The NYT and other major media outlets ignored Mac Donald’s work.

Meanwhile, no one is addressing the reasons that Blacks and Hispanics perform less well than Asians and whites in school. Could it be dysfunctional family structures or badly performing public elementary, middle, and high schools. Let’s fix that?

The statistics are sobering.

Mac Donald reports that only 8% of white college seniors with below-average undergraduate GPAs and below-average MCAT scores were offered a seat in medical school from 2013 to 2016, while less than 6% of Asian college seniors with those qualifications were offered a seat. This compares to more than 56% of Black college seniors with below-average undergraduate GPAs and below-average MCATs and 31% of Hispanic students with those scores who were admitted.

Mac Donald challenges DEI orthodoxy that systemic racism is responsible for demographic differences in educational performance. She attributes these difference to a skills gap. .

In conclusion, if the NYT now believes it is important for educational institutions to admit students based on merit, it will be hard for the editors to argue that employers must hire workers based on demographic diversity. Judges will also have to rethink the concept of “disparate impact” - which occurs when an employer’s workforce does not reflect demographic diversity.

It seems the conversation has fundamentally changed.