Following an announcement by Rice University ten days ago that it would reinstate racially discriminatory admission policies, the Center for Equal Opportunity today filed a formal letter of complaint against the school with the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights (OCR). The letter is posted on CEO’s website, www.ceousa.org.

In the letter, CEO points out that the Supreme Court’s recent decision involving the University of Michigan law school requires universities to consider racially neutral alternatives prior to using preferences based on race or ethnicity. Rice has not only considered but used such alternatives since a federal court of appeals in Texas banned preferences in 1996, and those alternatives have resulted in Rice having essentially the same percentage of African Americans that were admitted to the University of Michigan law school and nearly triple the number of Hispanics.

Thus, the letter concludes that for Rice to use preferences “in spite of a lack of any need to do so” violates the law. It asks OCR to investigate Rice’s announced new policy and require it to reembrace a nonpreferential approach.

CEO president Linda Chavez said: “We were disappointed in the Supreme Court’s decision earlier this summer to allow racial and ethnic admissions preferences, but the Court did at least put some significant limits on such discrimination. Universities ignore those limits at their peril.”

Chavez pointed out that CEO has already filed complaints with OCR regarding racially exclusive programs, which she said violate the Supreme Court’s requirement that students be given “individualized consideration.” She said: “I promise you that CEO will work on its own and with other organizations to ensure that the Court’s limits on racial preferences are followed in all respects.”

The Center for Equal Opportunity is a nonprofit, nonpartisan research and educational organization that studies civil rights, bilingual education, and immigration and assimilation issues nationwide.