Daily Lumina News 062823

With just days left before a sweeping new anti-diversity, equity, and inclusion law in Florida takes effect, government and college officials have been mum about how or when they plan to implement and comply with the law. For college faculty members and others, that silence is causing widespread confusion and anxiety.
Left to be determined includes what the state considers to be a diversity, equity, and inclusion initiative.

Continuous, equitable investment and support are vital to rewriting the "do more with less" narrative that has for too long dominated historically Black and predominantly Black community colleges (HBCCs and PBCCs), say Lumina Foundation's Wayne Taliaferro and Chandra Scott in this essay.
The turnaround can start by elevating the powerful stories of HBCCs and PBCCs—stories like how these colleges have been at the forefront of innovation, community building, and success despite less funding and visibility.

As the U.S. Supreme Court is once again on the brink of deciding whether colleges and universities can consider an applicant’s race when making admission decisions, its past rulings reflect a sharp split over what the Constitution and federal law allow.
Ahead of this year’s rulings in Students for Fair Admissions v. President and Fellows of Harvard College and Students for Fair Admissions v. University of North Carolina, here’s a look at some of the court’s past affirmative action decisions.

Hearing that race-conscious admissions practices are causing an uproar again is not new to the National Association for College Admissions Counseling’s David Hawkins. He tackled this issue before when the court heard challenges to affirmative action in Fisher v. Texas and Grutter v. Bollinger.
In this interview, Hawkins offers insight on centering racial equity in the admissions process.

The U.S. Supreme Court’s decision on the use of affirmative action in higher education could land with an outsized impact in Massachusetts, where several of the country’s most selective institutions of higher learning reside.
Massachusetts is home to 10 colleges that admit just 20 percent or fewer applicants in an academic year. All of those institutions have employed race-conscious admissions as part of efforts to foster diversity on campus, which the Supreme Court in the past has deemed to be a “compelling interest.”

For 58 years, the accreditation system of higher education has stood, enshrined in federal law and reaffirmed with each reauthorization of the Higher Education Act of 1965.
Now, a federal lawsuit from the state of Florida is looking to upend that entire system. Higher education lawyers and advocates say the lawsuit is more about politics than a serious legal challenge—though others say it makes a compelling case.