Thompson, the civil engineering student, says she'll recognize critical mass "when there are less racial incidents on campus, when students feel like they can go anywhere on campus and feel welcome, can go anywhere and speak their mind and not feel like they're going to be chastised for it, ridiculed for it, looked at crazy," she said. She loves UT, but says it's not there yet.
"To me that's the end goal: a welcoming campus, not a quantity of students."
Senior Jordan Grenadier's experience has been different.
"I don't ever feel like I walk on campus or walk into a classroom and only see one particular type of people," said Grenadier, who leads the campus chapter of the group Young Conservatives of Texas. On West Mall, where student groups set up tables, "it's so diverse whenever you walk down there, it's almost hard to imagine the university saying 'that's not good enough.'"
The question isn't "whether or not (diversity) is important," she said. "It's, 'Is it justified? Can someone who is qualified to attend the university not get accepted because someone who is maybe not as qualified gets in because of racial preferences?'"
UT-Austin's president, Bill Powers, who agrees critical mass is the "central question" in the case, says UT isn't just saying "we'll know it when we see it." He says "analytics," like classroom diversity surveys, will show UT if it's successfully preparing students to live and work in a diverse world.
"Right now, African-Americans and Hispanics are underrepresented," Powers said in an interview in his library-like office on campus. "We'll reach a critical mass when you can (see it) both in the campus atmosphere and the milieu in individual classes. Not 100 percent, but where a sufficient number of individual classes bring this cross-cultural environment."
"It really is going to hinge on what lens the court looks at the campus through," said Gerald Torres, who says diversity is key to meaningful conversations about environmental justice in his law school courses. "Is it the lens of the classroom or is it the lens of the campus? If it's the lens of the campus, then (the court) is likely to say the percentage increase of students of color under the 10 percent plan is sufficient. If they look at the classroom, I think they'll say it's not."
Attorneys for Fisher, who sued Texas after she was denied admission to UT-Austin in 2008, contend that by even referencing the state's demographics in its critical mass goals, UT is acknowledging a quota. They also argue the Supreme Court never intended to make diversity in every classroom the benchmark for critical mass.
"As long as you have a critical mass in the school as a whole, you're going to bump into people in the dorms, in the all-night bull sessions," Pell said. "That's what's going to give you the benefits of diversity. Now Texas says that's not good enough, you have to have diversity in every corner of the university, in every classroom, every major."
___
When she was a high school student, Ishop's parents — civil rights activists — hesitated to send her to UT. Now, as she travels the state as its chief recruiter, UT's historical legacy leaves some students skeptical the university will welcome them.
"There are still places and instances where that reticence still exists," she said. "It's not always just convincing the student of their appropriateness for a campus, but mom and dad and grandma."
While proud of what she now sees walking around campus, she rejects the notion that the lesson is UT can afford to be totally color-blind.
"We saw clearly what happened when we couldn't (use race) and it took seven years for those numbers to recover," Ishop said. If the campus has changed, "we didn't get here because we woke up one day, and boom, this is what the campus looked like. We got here because of very deliberate efforts."
But as the court scrutinizes those efforts, the justices will be asking, "How do you know know when there's enough?"
Reader Comments (