Gratz V Bollinger Case Analysis

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Gratz v. Bollinger
Throughout this course we have dealt with the resounding issue of the 14th amendment and in particular how it pertains to education. Another theme throughout this course has been strict scrutiny and how it is applied to cases. The 14th amendments equal protection clause ensures that all members of the United States have equal application of the law. From this, the Supreme Court has applied different levels of analysis in to these cases, in particular is strict scrutiny. These are cases that involve a suspect class, in this case race, and must show that a state body is intentionally discriminating. With that being said, I will be analyzing the supreme court case off Gratz v. Bollinger in which these ideas and themes are applied …show more content…

Bollinger, I believe that alternative plans of affirmative action would have yielded better results or possibly deterred the case entirely. The first of these two methods is the percentage method. First implemented in California state university programs in 1966, the percentage method allows a certain top percentage of high school graduates from the state. States like Texas followed implementing acceptance to state schools of students had a GPA in the top 10% of the class. Florida also followed suit implementing a top 20% percentile automatic acceptance. Also this plan may seem effective, serious problems arise when you look at graduate schools that rely on test scores rather than high school GPA. The other problem that percentage plans face is segregation. In neighborhood schools that are majorly populated by whites, would give a minority in that neighborhood a less likely chance of scoring in that top percentile. Along with segregation is the school size itself. A larger school with more students allows more students to be ranked in this top percentile whereas in small often minority schools, it gives less students the opportunities to earn these scholarships. The amici also pointed to the alternative forms of affirmative action stating that “the device of admitting a top percentage will not simultaneously produce high quality and diversity”

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