Fisher vs. University of Texas: Court Rules Abby Fisher is Basically Ginny Weasley

 Fisher v. University of Texas was decided on Monday, June 24, in a 7-1 decision. A summary can be found at SCOTUSBlog.

This is Abigail Fisher.

No, hold on. This is Abigail Fisher.

She applied to the University of Texas with a 3.59 GPA and an 1180 SAT in 2008, and they didn’t let her in.

She filed a lawsuit, saying U Texas was all:

...racially discriminating against her, a white girl, because other minority students, had been admitted with lower-quality applications.

UT won, and she appealed.

PRECEDENT BREAK: The relevant case here is Grutter v. Bollinger, which says affirmative action (the consideration of race and other diversity-achieving factors in college admissions) is legal.

The reasoning in Grutter was that schools have an interest in maintaining diversity.

The ruling in Fisher changes that a little, by changing the legal test that an affirmative-action program must pass in order to be kosher under the law: the “strict scrutiny” test.

It narrows the standard, requiring lower courts to OK the use of race in their admissions programs as a way to achieve diversity.

They have to establish that there is no other non-racially-focused factor that would also create a diverse student body.

SCOTUS sent the case back to the lower court to rule on UT’s program.

Meanwhile, Fisher has graduated from Louisiana State University.

So, affirmative action lives on, but with a little more supervision.

Originally posted at effyeahscotus.tumblr.com.