Monday, August 22, 2005

Affirmative Action and Education Standards

One of the interesting things about blogs and blogging is the plethora of interesing material out there. Nobel Prize winning economist Gary Becker and Judge Richard Posner have a blog (creatively titled The Becker-Posner Blog) which generally features more lengthy posts about a variety of topics of interest to the two gentlemen.

Recently Gary Becker posted an entry called On Affirmative Action.

The heart of the argument is this:

Most affirmative action programs, disguised or openly, use lower standards for African Americans and members of various other minority groups than for white males in determining whether they are promoted to higher level jobs in private business or government, admitted to better universities, and in other situations...It is obvious why affirmative action may hurt members of the majority group who are denied promotions or admission to various colleges, even though their records are better than many minorities accepted. But why is it bad for a country like the United States to do this, and often also for the minority groups gaining these privileges? My belief is that affirmative action is bad for any country that aspires to be a meritocracy, as the United States does, despite past slavery and discrimination that are terrible violations of this aspiration. The case for a meritocracy is that achievements based on merit produces the most dynamic, innovative, and flexible economy and social structure. Encouraging promotion or admission of less qualified applicants because of their race, gender, or other characteristics, clearly violates this principle, and produces a less progressive economy, and a distorted social structure.

Thus, Becker believes affirmative action is destroying America because it creates and perpetuates the very double standard that once existed as discrimination. Affirmative action now creates a lower standard for minorities rather than a higher standard created through more openly discriminatory programs of the past.

I can remember as a younger person hearing that standardized tests like the SAT and the ACT among others were "culturally biased." Today, a similar argument is being made against the NCLB standardized testing regime, although the term culturally biased is not used. The heart of NCLB, in my mind, is to hold schools accountable for teaching kids using ONE standard.

When people claim that testing to one standard is discriminatory in effect against minorities or the poor, what they ask for is an affirmative action style, double standard, i.e. a lower one for those lower on teh socio-economic ladder. Such a double standard inherently keeps such students down on that ladder. The question to ask when "advocates" posit a different standard is this, at what point in time will this double standard be lifted? The answer will always be some sort of wishy-washy statement like, "when the students demonstrate more capability of working at or above grade level" or some other mealy-mouthed horse puckey.

If you want education to be about providing opportunities, you cannot take opportunities away at the outset by making one group of people less beholden to group goals. Separating groups based on current skills and giving them a lesser goal does not aid them, it hinders them, just as affirmative action has hindered many minorities. Just because you can't do it now doesn't mean you won't be able to do it in the future with hard work.

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