UT Defends Use of Race as a Factor in Admissions

The University of Texas at Austin filed a brief Monday with the U.S. Supreme Court defending its use of race as a factor in admissions.

An applicant to UT filed the suit because she says she was denied admission in 2008 because she’s white.

The university says race is just one of many factors considered in admissions and that its use is necessary and constitutional.

UT-Austin President Bill Powers released a short video discussing the case. In it, he says officials are “confident the university will prevail.”

The Supreme Court is scheduled to hear the case on October 10.

The case questions the use of the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. In 2003, the Supreme Court ruled in Grutter v. Bollinger that the University of Michigan Law School's use of affirmative action was constitutional.