EDITORIAL: OPPOSE PROP 2; AFFIRMATIVE ACTION HELPS ECONOMY

By Mary Sue Coleman
Lansing State Journal
September 24, 2006

Michigan's economy is starting to simmer. Our state has engineered an ambitious jobs plan to reinvent the economy for the 21st century. Google has announced plans for a corporate office, and some 1,000 jobs, in Ann Arbor.

Rather than posting "help wanted" notices in exciting new sectors of our economy, I fear our state stands on the brink of telling the world, "Women and minorities need not apply."

That will be the disturbing scenario if Michigan voters approve the so-called Michigan Civil Rights Initiative - a misguided plan to ban affirmative action in state hiring and contracting and in admissions and outreach at public universities and community colleges. Advertisement

Voters need to understand the serious, long-term implications of MCRI. Recent research has pinpointed potential outcomes that may surprise people: It could eliminate after-school programs developed specifically for girls or for boys. It could severely limit universities' efforts to enroll more women, blacks, Latinos and Native Americans - just at a time when our state needs all the educated graduates we can offer employers.

Affirmative action works; it is a targeted, not heavy-handed, tool. Impressive social science research demonstrates the positive educational outcomes linked with diverse classrooms. Students learn better in a diverse class. They are more open to different perspectives, and are better prepared to participate in a global economy.

If we want to rebuild Michigan's economy, we simply must make higher education more accessible to all citizens. To do that, we must pay attention to gender, ethnicity, and socioeconomic class. If we ignore the realities of America in 2006, the future is bleak, and one need only visit California to see what can happen.

In 1996, voters banned affirmative action in California's public universities, as well as in public hiring. Since then, higher education leaders in that state have worked mightily to find other ways to create diverse student bodies at its highly selective universities, but their efforts have failed. California - the most diverse state in America - is educating fewer and fewer underrepresented minorities, at a time when its citizenry is ever more diverse.

In 1995, before California's affirmative action ban, underrepresented minorities made up 38 percent of California high school graduates and 21 percent of the University of California system's entering freshman class.

Nine years later, underrepresented minorities had fallen to just 19 percent of incoming freshmen.

The drop is especially troubling because African Americans and Latinos make up more and more of California's public high school graduates - 45 percent in 2004. The news is especially grim for fall 2006, when only 96 black freshmen, just 2 percent of the entering class, are expected to enroll at UCLA.

Michigan citizens need to consider the bitter lessons of California, where the goal of a diverse student body is slipping into oblivion. If Michigan's public universities leave behind talented women, African Americans, Latinos and Native Americans, we abandon our state's future.

Diversity is critical to revitalizing Michigan's economy. Without it, we jeopardize the ability of all citizens to contribute to our state.

Mary Sue Coleman is president of the University of Michigan and a member of the state's Strategic Economic Investment and Commercialization Board, which oversees the 21st Century Jobs Fund.