The Yale Law School Dean Heather Gerken stated that US News rankings were “profoundly flawed" and the process was “undermining the core commitments of the legal profession" , according to the New York Post.
Harvard Law has also stated that parts of the process for ranking methodology, “work against law schools’ commitments to enhancing the socioeconomic diversity of our classes; to allocating financial aid to students based on need; and, through loan repayment and public interest fellowships, to supporting graduates interested in careers serving the public interest."
Strive Asset Management founder Vivek Ramaswamy, a graduate of both Yale and Harvard, has told Fox News Digital, “I have a strong suspicion that the factors behind it, and especially the curious timing of these decisions, is driven by preparation for the Supreme Court striking down affirmative action, as I believe the Supreme Court should do, and is likely to do as well."
The triad and tribulations arose after Students for Fair Admissions sued Harvard and the University of North Carolina, alleging that the schools’ policies discriminated against Asian-American applicants.
The Supreme Court heard the oral argument Monday in the Although Percoco v. United States case. Experts are of the opinion that justices are likely to side with the plaintiffs and bar the use of affirmative action in college admissions.
Ramaswamy further informed New York Post that in case the US Supreme Court comes short of direct clarity on the controversial policy, if the court doesn't say affirmative action is unconstitutional and runs counter to the Civil Rights Act, this would give the law schools a lot of ‘wiggle room’
“And I think the calculus that some of them are making is to say that, ‘OK, if we can de-emphasize not only U.S. News & World Report rankings, but de-emphasize quantitative attributes for admission more generally, then at least we can achieve diversity by leaving it to randomness, leaving it to chance," Ramaswamy said. “To say that, ‘We can’t look at test scores, we can’t look at GPAs in the same way, and we’re not as quantitatively inclined towards meritocratic criteria, then we’re more likely to get a random dispersion, and a random dispersion is at least going to be slightly more visually diverse than a non-random one that’s actually tethered to test scores.’" New York Post quoted Ramaswamy.
“It is institutionalized racism in the purest form," Ramaswamy said. “I think it is the single greatest form of institutionalized racism in America today. And I think it is bad for Black Americans, as it is for White Americans, as it is for Asian Americans. It’s bad in different ways for each of those groups. And ultimately I think it’s a failed experiment."
“I think the fairest and most just system for attributing awards, including admission, is exclusively through merit," he later said. “What are your achievements? What are you excellent at? And that doesn’t just mean excellent in the classroom. It could be on the sports fields, it could be in an orchestra, could be in the arts. And yes it could be in math or science, in the classroom. But to use excellence in a colorblind manner as the sole arbiter in determining who gets ahead, who gets into these institutions."
The scenario he described is not without its downsides, Ramaswamy conceded, saying it may well result in less racially diverse classes.
But affirmative action, he said, is little more than a “Band-Aid." He advocated for going “upstream" to address the “root causes" of why many minorities are struggling academically, like “the failure in public education," or the breakdown of families.
