Category: Higher Education

(San Antonio, TEXAS) On behalf of the Edgewood Districts1, MALDEF today filed a Motion for Rehearing with the Texas Supreme Court urging the Court to remand the issue of facilities financing back to the trial court. Because the Supreme Court established a new legal standard for proving a violation of the Texas Constitution with respect to facilities financing, MALDEF argued that the Supreme Court should allow the trial court to conduct further proceedings on the matter.

In its opinion and judgment released on November 22, 2005, the Supreme Court recognized the glaring deficiencies in the Edgewood Districts that force them to place children in overcrowded classrooms, inadequate and unsafe science labs, and classrooms with inadequate heating, air conditioning and ventilation. The Court also recognized that property-poor districts cannot access the funds to address their needs, because the taxpayers in those districts cannot afford tax rates that are as much as twenty times higher than rates in property-rich districts. Despite the overwhelming evidence, the Court stated that the Edgewood Districts also should have presented evidence of similar facilities needs in other districts.

“The Court has never previously required evidence of ‘similar needs’ in other districts, only evidence of needs in the plaintiffs’ own districts and the disproportionate tax burden borne by their taxpayers. Nonetheless, in other far less important cases in which the Supreme Court developed new standards, the Court sent those cases back to the trial court and allowed the plaintiffs to present evidence relevant to the new standards,” said David Hinojosa, MALDEF Staff Attorney and lead counsel for the Edgewood Districts in the case.

He added: “The leadership in this State remains unconcerned and unresponsive to the facilities needs of children in property-poor districts. An efficient educational system, in the constitutional sense or in any other sense, cannot be one in which the children in property-poor districts continue to be subjected to dilapidated classrooms and dangerous learning environments. Texas’s legacy of neglecting the schools for the poor must end now.”

A national nonprofit organization founded in 1968, MALDEF promotes and protects the rights of Latinos through advocacy, community education and outreach, leadership development, higher education scholarships and when necessary, through the legal system.

[Press Release via email Dec. 7, 2005–gm]

Letters from the Editor of the Texas Civil Rights Review

The Jan. 9 statement that announced the revocation of “legacy” considerations in the admissions process, said, “not one student of the more than 10,000 who were admitted was admitted solely on the basis of legacy.”

If legacy has long been an admissions criterion and nobody has ever been admitted “solely” on its basis, then what about race? Wouldn’t it also be true that during the long years of considering race as an admissions factor, nobody was every admitted “solely” on the basis of race?

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Gates: Expects Flood of Emails as Mays Fails to Return Calls

Gates said he was prepared for a flood of e-mails on the subject and that he hopes most Aggies see this as the “next logical step” in a new approach to picking the A&M student body.

“My guess is that a lot of former students don’t really appreciate how little impact legacy has had on the process in the real world,” he said. “If the reality is that legacy helped 300 get in, the perception of some Aggies is probably that it’s 3,000.”

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Civil Rights does not mean equal opportunity, it means equal results. We do not even have equal opportunity in many situations (education, job income, etc.) and even if we did, IT WOULD NOT BE ENOUGH. It is time to take back from the white man what he has taken from us for so long. Affirmative action is a first step, but we must go further. We MUST require quotas for corporate America and educational institutions to ensure we get what we deserve and are entitled to. Texas A&M should be stripped of all state funds until it establishes an affirmative action policy, and if black students don’t exceed the percentage of the general populace within 4 years, funds should be revoked PERMANENTLY. First steps to freedom! [tsmith5001@yahoo.com 1/9/2004]

Fort Worth Star Telegram
DALLAS & STATE DIGEST
Wire Reports
AUSTIN

A group of angry state lawmakers implored Texas A&M University on Wednesday to change an admissions policy that gives preference to applicants whose parents or grandparents graduated from the school.

Representatives of state civil rights groups indicated that they would sue the school if the policy doesn’t change.

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