DENVER, Colorado — Students and academic professors say the Supreme Court's overturning of affirmative action will make it more difficult for college campuses to have a diverse student population.
Educators of color worry what it will mean for those students and the impact it will have on the workforce when they eventually have a degree.
"This was a very negative decision, certainly one that is going to have some impacts, make it harder for people from underrepresented backgrounds to make their way into spaces of education, which then impacts the workforce," said Dr. Michael Benitez, vice president for diversity and inclusion at Metropolitan State University of Denver (MSU).
The decision to strike down affirmative action in college admissions came Thursday, as the high court declared race cannot be a factor and forcing institutions of higher education to look for new ways to achieve diverse student bodies.
Chief Justice John Roberts said that for too long universities have “concluded, wrongly, that the touchstone of an individual’s identity is not challenges bested, skills built, or lessons learned but the color of their skin. Our constitutional history does not tolerate that choice.”
Benitez said the conversation should be more than about the issue of access to students. Even before the Supreme Court decision, the same intuitions that utilized affirmative action also struggled to retain students of color.
"We still have universities and institutions that even with affirmative action are wrestling and struggling to diversify their campus communities," Benitez said.
Some states have already banned affirmative action, including Michigan. Before the ban, Black students made up 7% of the student population at the University of Michigan in 2006. In 2021, that number had fallen to 4%.
Benitez said that institutions will have to find new, strategic ways to diversify those who are enrolled.
"I feel as though this is a huge step backward in the stepping stones that continue to gain equity in our shared spaces," said Kendall Taylor, a student at MSU studying art history and African studies. "I think this is going to have a huge impact repercussion. And when I mentioned going backward, it’s very in these efforts to address generational wealth disparities."
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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