By Lalit K Jha
Washington, Oct 25 (PTI) An influential Republican lawmaker on Wednesday urged the Trump administration to bring an end to discrimination against Asian-American students applying for admission to higher educational institutions in the US.
Congressman Dana Rohrabacher wrote a letter in this regard to the Education Secretary Betsy DeVos in the wake of the ongoing court case against the prestigious Harvard University.
"It is disheartening that the issue of discrimination against Asian-Americans in higher education is once again making headlines," he said.
"Allegations that Harvard University's use of race in its admissions process limits the number of Asian-Americans who are accepted is a sobering reminder that we have a long way to go to ensure that race is not used as criteria for academic opportunities," Rohrabacher wrote.
"Efforts to achieve a specific level of racial diversity inevitably costs some who are well-qualified for admission to be deprived of something they earned," he said.
Rohrabacher said it is critical that they get to the bottom of this so that applicants of any race or ethnic origin will be judged based on their merits rather than their ethnicity or skin color.
Students for Fair Admissions, an action group, has filed a lawsuit against the Harvard University, alleging that the 388-year-old institution treats Asian-Americans unfairly in its admissions process. Asian-Americans are held to higher standards than other group, it claimed.
As per the lawsuit, the prestigious university racially discriminated against Asian-American students by rating them lower than others applicants on traits like "positive personality,"
The group commissioned an analysis of admission data of more than 160,000 applicants who applied for admission from 2000 to 2015, which showed that Asians were given lower scores on "personality" traits - likability, courage, kindness and being "widely respected".
