Using Affirmative Action as a Remedy

It was May 11 and I was mired in the second of three-in-one-week, 4-hour road trip tours of Los Angeles County while attempting to get home via paratransit. A text message reached me from a concerned group leader with regard to the May 5 Pasadena City College Board of Trustees debate between Linda Wah and Kristine Kwong. One of the candidates, I was told, seemed to be evasive about responding to a question that was posed three different times. "That's odd," I mused. "What could that evasiveness indicate and which candidate was at issue?" So I asked those questions.

A tape of the debate was sent to me, along with some explanations.

Instead of viewing only the pinpointed segments, I watched the entire debate. The cause of the consternation was Candidate Kwong's responses to the question (implied as well as direct) about her stance on Affirmative Action ("AA").

What I saw in the full length of the debate was a lopsided and intense focus on AA from Kwong's perspective while only asking Wah once.

The irony is that Kwong answered the multiple instances of the same question (stated in the various ways). She responded by describing how it affects the populations while also expounding on remedies for the lack of favorable access in university admission.

On the other hand, Candidate Wah gave a monosyllabic response - "[I] Support [Affirmative Action]." - with no discussion of her concept of AA nor any thoughts about how (or even whether) it is a present-day issue.

The matter of AA is sometimes viewed as an objectionable issue. It attempted to remedy the gross opportunity disparity between White and Asian students compared to Black. The window of concern (in succeeding years) widened to include Hispanics. Is AA still needed for remediation of the effects of inequality? One expert source opines that it is the past practices that prevent effective remediation and equal opportunity for all. In other words, AA is not the answer.

One of the reasons why Asians were not included (directly or by inference) in the original 1980s enactment of AA was because that population traditionally excelled both in classroom performance and therefore university admission rates (plus stellar SAT scores). There was no need for the AA "equality crutch" for Asians, let alone Whites.

So its surprising to see the rhetoric about Asians and Whites concerned about a disadvantage. It is especially surprising when the catalyst for the debate question was an anonymous email sent to White and Asian constituents in San Marino, California, a neighboring affluent city. Could it be the debate was actually focusing on the Bakke premise that AA is a form of reverse discrimination, i.e., admission based on racial criteria? The difficulty with that premise is that AA was officially banned in California in 1996. Eight other states followed suit in the succeeding 24 years.

Please consider that when civil rights legislation was enacted in the mid-60s, there was an outright plan to prevent Asians from buying (and living in) properties in the Monterey Hills of South Pasadena. Yet today South Pasadena's demographics show a 35% Asian population, then followed by White, then followed by Hispanic. The only population still suffering a low presence (and disadvantage) is the 3% Black.

So the request to opine about the performance of Kwong in response to the question of AA was addressed. From my perspective, the question was from an uninformed source with regard to the validity of AA in today's California environment. The three instances of posing the question of Kwong's stance on the matter was simply a red herring, at best.

Focus needs to be on delivering better education and resources to access the current tools available to the general population (including infrastructure) and students attempting to better their knowledge and marketability in mainstream enterprise. In that regard, Kwong addressed those issues while her opponent offered no insight into how those issues can be addressed and maintained.