DaimlerChrysler executive Frank
Fountain, who is black, says affirmative action helped get him through the door,
but beyond that, he was on his own. "I had to compete just like everyone else
did for promotions," he says. "[Affirmative action] is really about competing
with the best talent that exists. It's not about giving anybody anything but
opportunity ... and I think that's still true today." Fountain is senior vice
president of external affairs and public policy for DaimlerChrysler, No. 43 in
The 2006 DiversityInc Top
50 Companies for Diversity®.
While students of color may have
weaker educational credentials than whites, there is little indication this
translates to work-force performance, according to a 2005 study by Harry Holzer
from the Urban Institute and David Neumark from the
University of California at
Irvine.
"Overall, the evidence suggests
that affirmative action improves both opportunities and outcomes for the
minority students and employees who are its direct beneficiaries," they write.
"In addition, Affirmative Action seems to generate positive external benefits to
others--such as minority and poor communities more broadly, and even perhaps
white students."
The
Real Concern: K-12 Education
Holzer and Neumark make an
additional point in their research: Affirmative action is not enough to level
the playing field. They write: "Pre-K programs and K-12 reforms that improve
student achievement, and thus link them more successfully to the labor market,
should be viewed as important complements to, and not necessarily substitutes
for, Affirmative Action policies."
But if the MCRI passes on Nov. 7,
developing this pipeline might be a problem.
Should the MCRI pass, it would be
much easier for the newly restructured Supreme Court--the replacement of moderate
Justice Sandra Day O'Connor with conservative Justice Samuel Alito--to strike
down voluntary integration programs in Seattle, Wash., and
Louisville, Ky. Both cases are on the Supreme
Court docket for December.
"I think being one of three states
in the union that has eliminated affirmative action will create a very negative
environment. It'll set the state back," says Fountain, who has raised $250,000
for Don't Roll Back Progress, part of the campaign to save affirmative action in
Michigan. "Proposal 2 is bad for business,
especially in an environment where we're trying to hold onto manufacturing jobs;
it's not the right signal."
MCRI campaigners call for improved
K-12 education and charge parents to invest more in their children's education.
But if even voluntary integration programs are outlawed, students of color will
not have equal opportunity to prepare for college. Studies consistently show
that students of color get teachers of lower quality, deal with more
distractions and are routed into fewer advanced-placement programs than white
students. If the MCRI passes, it'll prevent public schools from recruiting
diverse staff members to the detriment of all students, particularly students of
color, for whom visible role models are critical in development.
Moreover, any diversity program
targeted to specific racial/ethnic groups--educational outreach and recruitment,
for example--would be vulnerable to lawsuits.
"This is an issue that affects
your community in such a negative kind of way that you need to come out fighting
and you need to fight to win," says Fountain. "We have to defeat [the MCRI]. I
believe we have a chance. I believe there are good people in the state of
Michigan and I think ultimately, if they
really understood what they were voting for, they would vote
'no.'"
(See also: Who Is Paying to End
Affirmative Action? High-Ranking Bush Officials, Rupert
Murdoch)
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