At Harvard Admissions Trial, a Dean Defends Decades of His Work

The man who has done as much as anyone in the country to shape the field of college admissions nowadays took the stand on Tuesday to defend that work in a federal courtroom.

William R. Fitzsimmons, Harvard University’s dean of admissions, testified for more than two hours about how Harvard considers race when evaluating applicants for undergraduate admission. The university has been accused of discriminating against Asian-American applicants in a trial that started on Monday and is expected to last three weeks.

The case has drawn the public’s attention, both for its promise of forcing the revelation of details of Harvard’s once-secretive methods of evaluating high-school students and because it is seen as the beginning of another long fight over affirmative action that could be decided by the U.S. Supreme Court.

As the dean of admissions for 32 years, Fitzsimmons has been the main architect of Harvard’s admissions procedures. Much of the responsibility for defending that process on the national stage has fallen to him.

He answered questions in a mostly monotone voice, peering at John M. Hughes, a lawyer representing Students for Fair Admissions, the organization that sued Harvard in 2014, through a pair of wire-frame glasses. Hughes tried to extract precise answers to questions about admissions officials’ training materials, the different ratings applicants receive, and how race is treated in the process, but Fitzsimmons repeated over and over that the reality is more complicated than Hughes portrayed it.

Fitzsimmons tried to paint a picture of a complex process that is different for every student who applies to Harvard. Applicants’ race, he said, is never considered in isolation. But admissions officers do consider it an important part of students’ life experience. Harvard officials are impressed when applicants have overcome economic adversity or racial discrimination, he said. They believe those students have something to teach the rest of their potential classmates at Harvard.

A Report From 1990

Hughes tried to home in on data and specifics to make the case that, in that process, Asian-American applicants have been treated unfairly. He offered information about the numerical scores applicants receive in four categories: academic ability, athletic ability, extracurricular activity, and personality. Fitzsimmons insisted that while applicants receive numerical scores, the process is not formulaic. SAT scores, for example, are considered alongside students’ access to test-preparation classes and the support they might receive from their family.

“One test score is simply not equivalent to another standardized-test score,” he said.

Hughes showed passages from an instructional handbook for admissions officers, and asked Fitzsimmons to confirm that it included almost no mention of how to treat applicants’ race and ethnicity. Fitzsimmons responded that the handbook is a small part of how officers are trained, and that much information is passed “back and forth, from one admissions officer to another.”

Hughes also showed passages from an economist’s analysis of Harvard admissions data that projected what the Class of 2019 would have looked like had race not been considered in admitting its members. Doesn’t the analysis show, he asked, that if race had not been considered, the share of Asian-American students in the class would have risen from 24 percent to 27 percent?

“Asian-Americans as a group,” Hughes continued, “do not benefit from Harvard’s use of race in terms of how many Asian-Americans are admitted in a given class, correct?”

Asian-American students benefit from the consideration of race because the quality of their education improves when a class is made more diverse, Fitzsimmons said. He added that “certainly there are some Asian-Americans who end up at Harvard themselves because their background was a factor in admissions in a positive way.”

Hughes showed passages from a 1990 report by the U.S. Education Department’s Office for Civil Rights. The report, which cleared Harvard of racial discimination, said that some readers of applications thought that race was a factor when applicants received numerical scores on their academic, athletic, extracurricular, and personal achievements.

“Everyone is always vigilant to make sure race and ethnicity is used in the proper way,” Fitzsimmons said.

‘A Very, Very Different World’

When asked why Asian-American applicants receive lower scores in the personal category than white applicants do, Fitzsimmons offered an explanation: White applicants tend to receive better letters of recommendation from teachers and guidance counselors than do Asian-American applicants.

Hughes asked if admissions officials should have instructions for determining how much to weight an applicant’s ethnicity. Fitzsimmons said that there shouldn’t be a mechanical process because “each individual is unique.”

In the 1990 report the Office for Civil Rights also found that some admissions officials had described Asian-American applicants “as being quiet, shy, science/math-oriented, and hard workers.” Hughes asked Fitzsimmons if those stereotypical comments were “consistent with the way Harvard uses race in admissions.” Fitzsimmons responded that admissions officers “abhor stereotypical comments” and take the 1990 report very seriously.

Fitzsimmons also cited his own experience as a Harvard student in the 1960s. He said that at that time there were almost no students of color on the campus.

“It was a very, very different world,” he said. “I learned much, much less about what was going on in the world than our students today.”

His testimony was interrupted in the middle of the morning by a fire alarm that sent everyone from the packed courtroom in Boston out onto the sidewalk for about an hour. On Wednesday Hughes will continue to question Fitzsimmons. Then a lawyer for Harvard will cross-examine him.

Nell Gluckman writes about faculty issues and other topics in higher education. You can follow her on Twitter @nellgluckman, or email her at nell.gluckman@chronicle.com.