3/ Back in the bad old days, there were 2 ways higher ed institutions kept out students they didn't want. Straight up segregation, esp in the Jim Crow South. Or entrance exams, which provided the veneer of merit. And even now, there are racial gaps esp in math. www.brookings.edu/articles/sat...
4/ This is oversimplifying things I know, but weaponizing math SAT/ACT scores to keep out students is an extremely effective tool. I saw it first hand in Louisiana after its higher ed deseg agreement expired. 85% of Black students were briefly inelig for public U admission in the Jindal admin.
5/ I invite anyone wanting to take a deep dive into the war against the Jindal admin and its discriminatory admission criteria to check out my old blog. At the time I was an admissions director at a public HBCU. We were the front of the front line. lahigheredconfessions.wordpress.com/2025/02/17/u...
6/ There was no choice but to comply with the requirements. Very bad things would happen to our little institution if we didn't. I risked my career with my psudonymous blog and my other parapolitical activities fighting back.
7/ This isn't hyperbole. After the worst of the discriminatory requirements were rolled back, LSU briefly implemented "holistic admissions." The state pushed back-hard. If LSU couldn't do it, no one could. There's nothing bigger in Louisiana than LSU.
8/ I'm definitely NOT defending LSU's former president who eventually lost his job over mishandling of sexual abuse allegations. But he's not wrong about the admission criteria. LSU is currently 13% Black. Louisiana's population is 30% Black. www.timeshighereducation.com/news/king-al...