Panelists: Michaele N. Turnage Young (NAACP Legal Defense Fund), Natasha Warikoo (Professor at Harvard Grad School of Education), and Matt Cregor (Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights and Economic Justice).

Come learn about the lawsuit against Harvard and discuss what it and affirmative action in general means for Asian-Americans and all college students!

In 2014, a group of Asian American applicants sued Harvard University, alleging a racial quota limiting Asian Americans' admission. Edward Blum, the man who created the group, was also behind the last two unsuccessful Supreme Court challenges to affirmative action, brought on behalf of a White student. (Fisher v. Texas I & II.) The remedy Mr. Blum seeks remains the same: never allow Harvard - or any college - to consider students' race in admissions. However, to Asian American students, the matter is far more complex. This session will examine the following questions:

- What is affirmative action? What are holistic admissions policies?
- What is Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard about? How does it fit with other cases about race-conscious admissions?
- Who is Edward Blum?
- Why are Asian Americans the plaintiffs instead of Whites in this case?

The session will feature panelists with expertise in law, education, and ethnic studies. Panelists will present on these expository guiding questions during the first section of this event. Then, attendees will be encouraged to pose questions to lead into a guided discussion of issues of fairness, race, and affirmative action that builds off the established facts. In this way, the session aims to be both educational and investigative.

In order to give attendees the chance to speak in a more intimate setting, the discussion will break into small groups briefly before reconvening all together to debrief.

Hosted by the Task Force on Asian and Pacific American Studies (TAPAS), the Phillips Brooks House Association (PBHA), the Harvard Black Students Association (BSA), Harvard Fuerza Latina, the Harvard-Radcliffe Asian American Association (AAA), the Harvard-Radcliffe Chinese Students Association (HRCSA), the Harvard Korean Association (HKA), the Harvard Philippine Forum (HPF), Harvard South Asian Association (SAA), Harvard Vietnamese Association (HVA), and the Asian American Women's Association (AAWA).

Thanks to the COOP for funding!