Student Number: 0316733E Master of Arts (Industrial Psychology) Faculty of Humanities / The aim of this research project was to investigate final year university students’ attitudes towards affirmative action. In particular the current research investigated the final year students’ justice perceptions and attitudes towards affirmative action as well as their perceptions of job opportunities. The study also incorporated the role of locus of control in relation to the above mentioned variables. Prior research indicated that affirmative action is perceived as controversial in nature and has been accused of promoting inherent unfairness of practices and procedures that give preferential treatment to certain groups of people based on gender, race and ethnicity (Parker, Baltes and Christiansen, 1997). In addition affirmative action has been accused of reducing job opportunities for non-beneficiaries, as well as stigmatising those it aims to assist (Kravits and Plantainia, 1992). Therefore there arises a need to examine and explore affirmative action within South Africa, as much research has been conducted in the United States and is not applicable to South Africa. The present research was conducted using a quantitative, non-experimental cross sectional research design. The sample consisted of fourth year bachelor of accounting students. Five hypotheses were tested. The results indicted that support was found for three of the hypotheses, indicating that attitudes towards affirmative action differ between beneficiaries and non – beneficiaries. There is a relationship between perceptions of job opportunities and attitudes towards affirmative action as well as a relationship between justice perceptions of affirmative action and attitudes towards affirmative action in both beneficiaries and non-beneficiaries. The findings are discussed in relation to previous research. The implications of the research and the limitations of the study are outlined in the research report.

Thesis advisor: Utku Ünver / This dissertation consists of three chapters. The first chapter consists of a survey of the literature on affirmative action and diversity objective in school choice mechanisms. It presents and analyzes some of the main papers on the subject, showing the evolution of our understanding of the effects that different affirmative action policies have on the welfare and fairness of student assignments, the satisfaction of the diversity objectives as well as the domain of policies that allows for stable outcomes. The second chapter analyzes the problem of school choice mechanisms when policy-makers have objectives over the distribution of students by type across the schools. I show that mechanisms currently available in the literature may fail to a great extent in satisfying those objectives, and introduce a new one, which satisfies two properties. First, it produces assignments that satisfy a fairness criterion which incorporates the diversity objectives as an element of fairness. Second, it approximates optimally the diversity objectives while still satisfying the fairness criterion. We do so by embedding "preference" for those objectives into the schools' choice functions in a way that satisfies the substitutability condition and then using the school-proposing deferred acceptance procedure. This leads to the equivalence of stability with the desired definition of fairness and the maximization of those diversity objectives among the set of fair assignments. A comparative analysis also shows analytically that the mechanism that we provide has a general ability to satisfy those objectives, while in many familiar classes of scenarios the alternative ones yield segregated assignments. Finally, we analyze the incentives induced by the proposed mechanism in different market sizes and informational structures. The third chapter (co-authored with Orhan Aygün) presents an analysis of the Brazilian affirmative action initiative for access to public federal universities. In August 2012 the Brazilian federal government enacted a law mandating the prioritization of students who claim belonging to the groups of those coming from public high schools, low income families and being racial minorities to defined proportions of the seats available in federal public universities. In this problem, individuals may be part of one or more of those groups, and it is possible for students not to claim some of the privileges associated with them. This turns out to be a problem not previously studied in the literature. We show that under the choice function induced by the current guidelines, students may be better off by not claiming privileges that they are eligible to. Moreover, the resulting assignments may not be fair or satisfy the affirmative action objectives, even when there are enough students claiming low--income and minority privileges. Also, any stable mechanism that uses the current choice functions is neither incentive compatible nor fair. We propose a new choice function to be used by the universities that guarantees that a student will not be worse off by claiming an additional privilege, is fair and satisfies the affirmative action objectives whenever it is possible and there are enough applications claiming low--income and minority privileges. Next, we suggest a stable, incentive compatible and fair mechanism to create assignments for the entire system. / Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2014. / Submitted to: Boston College. Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. / Discipline: Economics.

The main goal of affirmative action (AA) policies is to give opportunities otherwise nonexistent to minorities and underprivileged students. In this paper, I investigate whether the introduction of a college affirmative action policy enables AA beneficiaries to obtain a career in Law and to catch up with high scoring candidates who did not get admitted due to the policy (i.e., displaced candidates). To do so, I use a new dataset from UERJ admission office, a prominent public university in Rio de Janeiro, which was the first in Brazil to adopt a quota system for both black and public school students. I combine this dataset with the OAB exam passage records, equivalent to the American Bar exam. Preliminary results suggest that the quota policy improves OAB passage rates for beneficiaries. I find that lawyer certification for underprivileged students increases by 51 p.p., even though they underperform by 4.56 p.p when compared to displaced candidates. I also present evidence that displaced candidates do not experience any drop in their OAB exam passage rates due to the policy. Furthermore, I find that public school quota beneficiaries who score close to the admission cutoff present an increase in the probability of passing the OAB exam by up to 52 p.p. / O principal objetivo de políticas de ação afirmativa (AA) é dar oportunidades, em geral inexistentes, aos membros da sociedade menos privilegiados, em especial àqueles pertencentes a minorias. Neste trabalho, é feita uma análise acerca do impacto da política de cotas no curso de Direito da primeira universidade pública a adotar a política de cotas no Estado do Rio de Janeiro, a UERJ, de forma a estimar os efeitos da política após o ensino superior. Especificamente, o quanto a política impulsiona seus beneficiários e em que medida permite que estes se aproximem de candidatos que obtiveram pontuação alta no vestibular, mas não foram admitidos exclusivamente por causa da reserva de vagas. Adicionalmente, o impacto sobre estes últimos, que também são diretamente afetados. Para tanto, foram utilizados dados do processo de admissão do curso de Direito da Universidade do Estado do Rio de Janeiro (UERJ), considerado de alto prestígio, em conjunto com as listagens de aprovação no exame da Ordem dos Advogados do Brasil. Os resultados indicam que a política aumenta em 51p.p. a probabilidade de certificação dos candidatos que se beneficiam da política, apesar de os mesmos ainda apresentarem 4.56p.p. menos chance de certificação do que os candidatos displaced. Além disso, há evidências de que a política não afeta negativamente as chances de aprovação na OAB dos candidatos displaced que pontuaram pouco abaixo do corte de admissão na UERJ. Por outro lado, a política é capaz de aumentar a certificação dos alunos admitidos para vagas destinadas ao sistema de ensino público com pontuação próxima ao corte em até 52p.p.

Using a structural topic model text analysis approach in a mixed methods framework, these studies seek to better understand the language, rhetoric, and rationales amici curiae employ to defend or deride affirmative action in cases before the Supreme Court. Through a better understanding of the content and framing of these briefs, the next time an affirmative action case is before the court a larger, more articulate, and more united network of advocates from the higher education sector and beyond will be better position to have their voices heard.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, 1983. / Vita. Abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 265-269). Also available via the Internet.

<p> <p>&nbsp / </p> </p> <p align="left">People with disabilities are a minority group who has suffered disadvantage especially in the workplace. They currently enjoy Constitutional and legislative protection in a democratic South Africa.</p>

ABSTRACT Joseph Echols Lowery, a key founding member of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference in 1957, led the organization for twenty years. This study explores how Lowery, who took over during an era when many considered the civil rights movement dead, reenergized the SCLC, became a leading black spokesman who challenged Congress, presidents and the Justice Department around issues of voting rights and social justice, while consistently questioning U.S. hegemonic international and domestic policies around jobs and poverty. This research further investigates how Lowery fought for the continuation of affirmative action in the midst of an oftentimes hostile environment and waged campaigns against multi-national companies that discriminated against blacks and minorities. This qualitative empowerment study examines how and why Lowery and the SCLC became the leading non-Muslim influence on the 1995 Million Man March and his role in affirming women leaders and their initiatives.

Thesis (MTech (Human Resource Management))--Cape Technikon, Cape Town, 2003. / Also available online.

This dissertation examines trends in access for Black students at public institutions in Texas, specifically, the University of Texas at Austin (UT-Austin), in the context of automatic admission laws and race-based admission policies. Thus, the current study explores how Black students matriculate through the educational pipeline from high school graduation through college enrollment. For this study, I utilize Critical Race Theory as the framework to analyze data for Texas high school students from 2000 through 2010. I employed a quantitative methodological approach, which includes both descriptive analyses and logistic regression. Black people are facing seemingly bleak educational outcomes throughout the education pipeline -- they are less likely to graduate from high school, be college ready, apply to a competitive four-year institution, be admitted, enroll, persist and graduate. Automatic admission laws and affirmative action have been implemented to address these issues, especially for selective institutions. Increased access to Texas' most selective public institution, UT-Austin, may lead to higher persistence and graduation rates for Black students compared to other state colleges and universities. However, Black students remain the most underrepresented group at UT-Austin in spite of these laws and policies. This study is unique because no other research has examined how automatic admission laws and affirmative action operate simultaneously. Moreover, this study fills in some significant gaps in the literature as it relates to Black students in higher education. Findings from this study suggest that while there is progress toward access for Black students at UT-Austin, there is still room for growth. Despite perceptions that Black students do not want to attend UT-Austin, this study found that Black students were more likely to apply to the University compared to White students when holding other factors constant. However, the research findings indicate that White students still have an admissions advantage over Black students even when accounting for SAT scores, family background and the type of high school a student attended. Furthermore, Black students are less likely to enroll at UT-Austin compared to their White counterparts. Finally, the results from this study also suggest that affirmative action has not had the same impact for Black students under the top 10% plan as it has when the policy was used by itself. / text

This project traces the ways universities articulate a desire for diversity through the gateway genres of college admissions, composition course placement, and first-year-composition (FYC). Together, these genres serve as points of access for a theoretical study that seeks to better understand the ideological function of writing programs to socialize borderline college applicants into the rhetorically constructed role of a Diverse College Student. I focus on what I call bootstraps genres--reoccurring rhetorical situations that call for students to recount social hardships like racism and classism as personal hardships to be overcome through personal heroics. Despite being immersed in rhetorics of individualism, the college application essay, the directed self-placement guide, and the literacy narrative all call for the mimetic construction of disadvantage as an appeal to college-readiness. As new college students move through the initiation rituals of admissions, orientation, and FYC, they are presented with rhetorical tasks that are both raced and classed. Bootstraps genres ask students to first read the university's desire for diversity and then fulfill that desire through personal stories of difference and disadvantage.