University makes major push for diversity without considering race, gender in admissions

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University makes major push for diversity without considering race, gender in admissions

Past Supreme Court rulings have allowed colleges to consider race in their admissions processes and about 40 percent do. But the justices will soon revisit the issue and could overturn years of precedent. John Yang visited a university making a big push to improve diversity without the consideration of race or sex in the admissions process. It's part of our series, "Rethinking College."

John Yang:

The University of California, Berkeley, accepted only about 11 percent of applicants for this year's freshman class, which is one of the most diverse in decades. Nearly 70 percent are U.S. students of color.

The university is trying to boost the number students that it defines as underrepresented. That includes African Americans, Chicanx, Latinx, Native Americans, Alaskan Natives, and Pacific Islanders. They have made some progress, but diversity number still have not returned to where they were in the 1990s.

In 1996, California voters approved a ballot initiative, Proposition 209. It said that race, ethnicity and sex could not be used in hiring or admissions decisions at state institutions, including colleges and universities. The result? A dramatic drop in the number of underrepresented minority students.

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