Affirmative action in admissions occurred only at elite colleges, not nonelite ones

Evidence

The same story appears to hold for university admissions. During the 1980s, the most selective four-year colleges were most likely to admit African American and Hispanic students preferentially. In nonelite schools, which 80 percent of college students attend, students of different races with similar characteristics were admitted at essentially the same rate (Kane, 1998). Elite colleges were not harmed by their energetic affirmative action practices; by the end of the decade, their tuition had risen disproportionately compared with other universities’, as had the number of students applying for admission. — David Theo Goldberg, John Solomos, A Companion to Racial and Ethnic Studies, 1976

Categorization

• XREF: Contradicts the popular image of affirmative action affecting all college applicants; connects to the ‘trimmed but not rejected’ federal pattern in paragraph 1972.