Penn State released a statement after the U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday rejected race-conscious admissions in higher education at Harvard University and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, overturning more than 40 years of legal precedent.
Major new outlets, including NPR, are reporting that the ruling in the two cases hands opponents of affirmative action a major victory.
Penn State did not directly criticize the court’s ruling, but said the university "remains resolute that diversity among students, faculty and staff deepens the educational experience Penn State offers and the range of opportunities the university’s students enjoy"—and says that people from different backgrounds—including racial or ethnic—"greatly contribute to the academic discourse that is vital to higher education."
The statement also says Penn State remains "committed to enhancing the diversity of [its] academic community."
Read Penn State's full statement below:
"In the wake of [Thursday's] Supreme Court ruling, Penn State remains resolute that diversity among students, faculty and staff deepens the educational experience Penn State offers and the range of opportunities the University’s students enjoy. People with differing perspectives and from different backgrounds — be they racial or ethnic, financial, geographic, or cultural, to name a few — greatly contribute to the academic discourse that is vital to higher education. We remain committed to enhancing the diversity of our academic community, and believe higher education provides enormous personal, professional and societal benefits and should be accessible to students from as many different backgrounds as possible."
