ABSTRACT
Now that we have established the many ways white students are favored over nonwhites throughout the years of primary and secondary schooling in this country, we can examine the way affirmative action for people of color does and does not operate in higher education. After all, we might acknowledge that the earlier years of school provide advantages to whites and still claim that affirmative action programs at the college and university level, as well as in law schools, medical schools, and graduate institutions, more than balance out those prior preferences. We might still claim that affirmative action in higher education amounts to unfair preference, even though the larger system of preference favors members of the dominant group.
