Harvard-Backed Program Drops ‘Students Of Color’ Requirement After Legal Complaint

Authored by Anna Poff via The College Fix,

A Harvard-backed summer scholarship program accused of racial discrimination quietly revised its eligibility language after a legal complaint, but critics told The College Fix the change came too late.

The Union Scholars summer scholarship program is headed by the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees, with support from Harvard University, including the use of its facilities and a partnership with the school’s Center for Labor and a Just Economy and the Wurf Fund, according to a federal complaint from the Equal Protection Project.

“After we filed the complaint and it was reported in The NY Post, AFSCME changed its website to remove the ‘students of color’ language – but that’s too late and too little,” EPP President William Jacobson told The College Fix via email.

“The program itself is intended for students of color, the website just said the quiet part out loud. This program still violates the law even though they are trying to hide the evidence,” he said. 

Jacobson also said that “The removal of incriminating language after the complaint was filed reflects a consciousness of guilt – there would be no reason to change the website if the program didn’t discriminate.”

He added that “the Harvard programs must be open without regard to race as a matter of law and common decency.”

The program is “a summer scholarship and internship opportunity” for students who want to promote “social and economic justice,” according to its website.

“Like our union, the program supports our vision of growing a diverse union movement founded on principles of inclusivity,” the website states.

It takes place over seven weeks in the summer, including a four-day orientation followed by six weeks of field placement at a “union organizing campaign in one of several locations across the United States.”

A disclaimer at the bottom of the website says AFSCME is an equal opportunity employer and prohibits discrimination based on race, sex, national origin, disability, or other protected characteristics.

The College Fix attempted to reach the AFSCME and Harvard via email, but has not received a reply.

Do No Harm Senior Fellow Mark Perry told The Fix that he “wasn’t surprised to hear about another case of illegal discrimination involving Harvard University.”

Perry said he “has filed nearly 1,000 federal civil rights complaints for more than 2,500 violations of Title VI (race) and Title IX (sex) at more than 850 colleges and universities.”

Of those, roughly a dozen were “federal civil rights complaints against Harvard.” 

Some complaints targeted Harvard alone, while others involved the school’s participation in joint ventures with outside organizations, similar to its current relationship with AFSCME.

Perry said that “those complaints were successfully resolved when Harvard agreed to discontinue its partnerships with external organizations that used Harvard’s brand name, facilities, faculty, and academic reputation to promote programs that discriminated based on race.”

He said he anticipates a similar outcome in the EPP’s complaint against Harvard, arguing that the university’s partnership with AFSCME and the program’s discriminatory practices cannot be legally justified.

“Given the past successful challenges of Harvard’s violations of federal civil rights laws, it’s disappointing that Harvard continues to engage in illegal race-based discrimination, especially after the Supreme Court ruled that Harvard’s race-conscious admissions policies were unconstitutional and illegal,” Perry told The Fix.

“Unfortunately, Harvard apparently still hasn’t learned that compliance with federal civil rights laws isn’t optional or voluntary: it’s legally mandated,” he said.

Perry commended the EPP “for exposing and challenging Harvard’s latest attempt to circumvent federal civil rights laws.”

He said he is expecting the group to “prevail with a legal victory at the Civil Rights Division of the U.S. Department of Justice.”