When a Promise Is Broken, What’s Left but Anger? : Affirmative action: Once, minorities could hope that hard work would earn a spot at UC.

The University of California Board of Regents vote to abolish affirmative action in student admissions was a striking blow to the aspirations of many minority youth who see their access to higher education narrowing daily.

As an African American professor at UCLA, I have spent many Saturdays and evenings urging minority youth to prepare for admission to the university system. I remember doing so several years ago with a group of visiting junior high school students. One student’s question was quite challenging: “If I take all the right courses and get high grades, how do I know I will be able to come to UCLA?” My reply was that as long as they met the minimum requirements, they would gain admission. I said, “Those of us who have made it will see to it that your efforts will pay off.”

Affirmative action allowed me to assure these hard-working black, Latino, and poor white students that their efforts would be rewarded with admittance. Today, I have to admit that my boast has turned hollow. I am angry that the self-importance of a black businessman from Sacramento and the political aspirations of a mean-spirited governor have derailed the hopes and dreams of so many minority youth. If I, an accomplished African American at or near the top of my profession am angry, imagine how my less fortunate kin must feel.

Their and my anger is justified. We have become victimized by a society where we lack the appropriate public forums to discuss and debate the merits of an obviously contentious issue.

In a state where the future belongs to children of color, our state has shown a contempt for that future by a systematic pattern of disinvestment in public education. The students who benefit from affirmative action are not the gangbangers, dropouts, and educational failures, but, rather those who have decided to play by the rules; the kids who study hard, stay out of trouble, and aspire to contribute positively to society. We have saddled them with poorly funded schools, teachers with low morale, and facilities that do not support their needs and told them to succeed on an even playing field with students who attend the best private schools that money can buy. Which policy is unfair--certainly not affirmative action!

My anger will find an outlet. But what do I say to those who do not have a means of expressing their anger. No longer can I say “just take the right courses and do well.” That is no longer enough.