Last fall, Stanford University released a lengthy report—based on a number of damning internal memos—detailing how in the 1950s its admissions office systematically excluded Jews, while declaring vociferously that it employed “no quotas for Catholics or Jews,” or any other “racial, religious, or geographic” group. The current president, Marc Tessier-Lavigne, publicly apologized for his institution’s previous actions. But John Rosenberg wonders if the prestigious West Coast college has really learned the lessons of its prior mistakes:
Someone should ask Marc Tessier-Lavigne why he believes the policy of restricting the number of Jews was wrong. Does he really believe in the principle that administrators in the 1950s violated, that all applicants should be treated “paying no attention” to race, ethnicity, or religion? That, of course, would seem to be impossible, since Stanford has long practiced affirmative action, i.e., raising and lowering the standard of admissions by race and ethnicity in order to promote diversity, not unlike the “balance” President Wallace Sterling and [Dean of Admissions] Rixford Snyder sought in the 1950s.
The recent Stanford report is impressive, but it is not without blind spots. The most glaring is its failure to acknowledge that its policy of restricting Jews is more than similar to the racially and ethnically discriminatory policies of Stanford and similar institutions today; it is virtually identical. The old descriptions and defenses—creating “balance,” judging each candidate individually, denying quotas—are still very much in use. In fact, Rixford Snyder . . . and Sterling should be recognized as creating Stanford’s first affirmative-action program—preferential treatment for non-Jewish applicants.
Read more on Minding the Campus: https://www.mindingthecampus.org/2022/12/21/affirmative-action-at-stanford-then-and-now/