“We despair at the Court’s striking of race-conscious admissions,” began the June 30 editorial, titled “Harvard’s Fight to Keep Diversity Alive is Just Beginning.”

“We now find ourselves in a state of utter post-affirmative action loss,” it continued. “A loss for our University, a loss for progress, and a loss for our nation resound in the aftermath of this decision.” …

However, “considering socioeconomic status instead of race won’t achieve the same racially diverse outcomes that affirmative action once helped promote because racial disparities exist beyond class,” Dial wrote.

[Actually, class disparities exist beyond race, and that’s what Harvard’s policies ignored. Like other universities, they treated race identities not just as determinative but monolithic, which meant that the benefit of their policies got distributed not just to descendants of American slavery but to African immigrants and otherwise economically well-positioned black Americans. Instead of selling despair, Harvard should focus on achievement and likelihood of success first, and economic diversity second. Race is not an impediment; poverty is. — Ed]