Education is often the key for students to unlock their potential, but discriminatory policies are denying students the chance for a quality education.
Discrimination has no place in our nation’s schools, colleges, and academic programs.
Racially discriminatory policies are insidious and just the latest iteration of the long-rejected idea that race and sex ought to determine opportunity in America. All men are created equal, and every person is guaranteed equal protection of the laws.
As Chief Justice John Roberts rightly said, “The way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race.”
Pacific Legal Foundation fights to ensure that students aren’t denied a quality education because of their race or sex.
New York City’s Specialized High Schools are some of the best public schools in the nation: They boast Nobel Laureates, writers, astronauts, entrepreneurs, and musicians among their alumni. But in 2018, Mayor Bill de Blasio called the schools “a monumental injustice” because of their “diversity problem.” His administration revised the admissions criteria to favor certain middle schools—thereby increasing black and Hispanic enrollment while decreasing Asian enrollment. New York parents sued, with Pacific Legal Foundation’s help. In 2024, after nearly six years of litigation, we won an initial victory: The Second Circuit ruled the plaintiffs had successfully shown the discriminatory effects of the new admissions policy. Litigation now continues on whether the city had discriminatory intent.
Last month, Gov. Kathy Hochul announced that New York would opt into the new federal school choice scholarship program created by Congress.
Yi Fang Chen’s son certainly had the grades to get into New York City’s prestigious Stuyvesant High School. Just one problem: He’s the wrong race.
A constitutional amendment currently pending, ACA 7, would authorize a referendum to peel back the California Constitution’s strong prohibitions on discrimination in public education.
A scholarship once reserved for Black students at a California university is now available to all after a White student and a right-wing nonprofit alleged it violated a federal anti-Ku Klux Klan law.
A scholarship for Black students at UC San Diego is now available to anyone, regardless of race, after students and a right-leaning nonprofit organization sued the university for discrimination this J…
The district has been accused of operating academic programs that are only marketed to Black students
A California-based civil rights organization is now suing Fresno Unified School District for racial discrimination.
The policy of race-based admissions to Californias’s UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospital Oakland internship program is facing a very serious federal lawsuit.
Every November, students vying for a spot at one of New York City’s eight Specialized High Schools take the admissions exam that will determine their academic trajectory. The notoriously rigorous Sp…
PLF challenges Boston’s tier-based school admissions, arguing it discriminates against white students via geographic proxies in violation of Equal Protection.
The Fourteenth Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause forbids the government from using immutable characteristics—like race—to discriminate against individuals. Even so, governments have taken to u…
For many, going to college is a rite of passage—a step toward opportunity and realizing the American dream. College is where students meet like-minded peers, experience life away from home, and begi…
After nearly six years of litigation, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit has issued a major victory for New York City parents in the case of CACAGNY v. Adams. The court ruled the plainti…
When siblings Mary Beth and John Tinker were just 13 and 15 years old, they found themselves at the center of a major Supreme Court case. The Court’s 1969 ruling would later be remembered as a groun…
Does free speech have age restrictions? The Supreme Court says no. But one California judge ignored the Court’s landmark decisions and upheld a public school’s decision to punish a first-grader ov…
A student’s race should not determine their access to public educational programs. The Constitution’s Equal Protection Clause specifically safeguards against this kind of discrimination. Yet, this…
It’s a brave new world out there for college admissions officers. Gone are the days when they could use racial stereotypes as a stand-in for an applicant’s personal qualities or deduct points for …
