Meritocracy vs. Diversity....is there a right answer?

ucbalumnus
Thu, 09 May 2019 04:41:05 +0000

TooOld4School:

Uni diversity, by contrast, has the outward goal of creating a racial diverse/sexual identity diverse cohort

The actual goal is business/marketing based. Some prospective students have unstated preferences about the racial/ethnic composition of the college in terms of it affecting desirability to them (many do not want there to be “too few” of their own kind, although “too few” can vary). So to maximize marketability to prospective students, the university wants “enough” of each to avoid “too few” for any group becoming negative marketing to students of that group.

For gender, some prospective students want there to be roughly equal numbers of each gender, so that factors into college marketability.

Marketability to other persons or entities of interest, such as donors, political pressure groups (whether they protest, lobby, or sue), government entities, etc. can also play into what a college wants to do here.

It may not be possible to satisfy all persons or entities of interest regarding this topic.