Let's 'act affirmatively' to expand opportunity for all

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The justices of the Supreme Court are poised to end affirmative action as we know it, and they probably should. Not because we should stop acting affirmatively, but because we should stop acting as if opportunity can only be available to some if it is denied to others.

We should act affirmatively to expand opportunity so that it can be available to all of us without being denied to any of us.

The belief that opportunity is limited was the assumption lurking behind the entire five-hour debate before the court on Oct. 31. Justice Samuel Alito said so explicitly "… college admissions is a zero-sum game." It was clear from the debate that the justices buy into the assumption that opportunity is limited. It was equally clear that a conservative majority will say that since you can only provide more opportunity to people of color by taking it away from white and, in the case of higher education, Asian people, doing so would violate the Constitution. That will end affirmative action as we know it.

If so, we and the court should also put an end to the assumption that achieving diversity, equity and inclusion is a zero-sum game. Rather the court should challenge us to make opportunities available to all of us by expanding rather than limiting them. As an example of what's possible, consider Dartmouth College and the education of women.

When I arrived at Dartmouth in 1967, women were not admitted to Dartmouth and never had been. For centuries women had been denied opportunities all across the board. This was still the era when women's participation in the labor force was extraordinarily small. Their participation in higher education, in the professions, in leadership roles were low to nonexistent.

By 1967 institutions like Dartmouth were being confronted with their own pasts of privileging men over women. On the other hand, opposition to admitting women to Dartmouth was extraordinarily high. It emanated from one central fear — that admitting women on an equal basis with men would require admitting fewer men (the sons of alums and major donors) — that there would be winners and losers.

The solution that the president of Dartmouth came up with was ingenious. He could see that the only way to make inclusion work would be to create opportunities for women without reducing opportunities for men. And that meant he had to expand the availability of opportunities. But how?

He couldn't double the size of the college overnight as it was then designed. He needed a new design. And that was the ingenious part. Dartmouth operated then on the quarter system — fall, winter, spring, summer — but the summer session was vastly underutilized, there was no real summer quarter at all. So, Dartmouth's leader redesigned the calendar in two ways. He made the summer session equal to the other three quarters, and he required that every student spend one quarter each year away from campus — to study abroad or intern with nonprofits, governments or businesses.

The new design expanded capacity — so much that over time he could admit women on an equal basis with men without reducing opportunities for men.

It was massively smart. It directly addressed the fear of their male students and alumni. And it worked. More opportunity has resulted in greater diversity, equity and inclusion. (Though Dartmouth has plenty of work to do to provide similar opportunities to others who have been denied them.) Today all four quarters at Dartmouth are equally attractive to all students. In fact, the summer quarter is maybe the most attractive. More than half of the people who enroll at Dartmouth today are women and virtually no one is complaining about it.

The principal of one of our high schools told of his too-often failed efforts to get the IB program into his school. The district had denied his requests repeatedly. His was a school where a very large percentage of the students were students of color, and a large percentage were also of lower income. The principal believed that his students — though they did not "fit" the profile of those who had traditionally had the IB program available to them — could in fact handle it and would rise to the occasion. He argued that capability, talent and motivation are not limited to only a few but too often opportunities are.

He was right. That year he got his chance to put IB into his school. By the end of the next year nearly half of his school was enrolled in the program, and most were succeeding. The program is still there.

These examples show us that we don't have to accept that opportunity is a zero-sum game. By making opportunities available to those who have been denied them we can substantially increase diversity, equity and inclusion. More importantly they show us that we can create opportunities for those who have been denied them without denying opportunities to others.

Affirmative action defined as a zero-sum contest may die in this term of the court. If so, it must be replaced by the obligation to act affirmatively to expand opportunities overall and make them available to those who have been denied them. The court should be the first to say so. But whether it does or not, we can, should and must act to expand opportunity to all of us so that it is denied to none of us.