What the court agreed to hear
The Supreme Court on Monday agreed to take up a new challenge to school admissions policies meant to promote diversity, according to NBC News. The case involves a lottery-based process for magnet programs in Montgomery County, Maryland, a large and diverse suburban county outside Washington, D.C.
The justices will consider an appeal from the Association for Education Fairness, which is trying to revive a lawsuit it filed against the Montgomery County Board of Education. The group contends that the policy governing the county's STEM and humanities magnet schools unfairly boosts Black and Latino applicants and so violates the 14th Amendment.
The policies at issue
The policy concerns a group of four middle schools with magnet programs. Those programs are now filled through a lottery, a system introduced during the Covid pandemic. Eligibility to enter the lottery depends on how well students score on tests compared with other students in their own school. The plaintiffs say that approach harms Asian students who attend high-performing schools.
The challengers also target an earlier approach introduced in 2017 and since discontinued. It was intended to increase enrollment of children from low-poverty areas and followed a report finding that Black and Latino students were underrepresented in the county's middle school magnet programs, while Asian students were overrepresented. That effort included outreach to students and a cognitive test.
The plaintiffs say both programs were explicitly designed to raise Black and Latino enrollment, which they argue violates the Constitution.
A narrower question than 2023
In 2023, the Supreme Court relied on the 14th Amendment when it struck down the use of race in college admissions. The Maryland case is different, NBC News reported. It asks the justices to resolve a more technical question about what evidence challengers must bring to make this kind of claim. As a result, the court is not poised to issue a ruling on the underlying constitutional issue.
A federal judge in Maryland and the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals both ruled in favor of the school district. The challengers are asking the Supreme Court to overturn those outcomes and allow their lawsuit to proceed.
The wider debate
Since the 2023 decision, conservatives, including some members of the court, have accused colleges and schools of trying to get around the ruling. The accusation is that they have adopted new admissions policies with the same purpose that do not explicitly treat race as a factor. Similar cases have reached the court, but the justices declined to hear them.
This is also the second time in recent years the court has taken a case involving Montgomery County Public Schools. Last year, it ruled for parents who objected on religious grounds to LGBTQ-themed books approved for use in elementary school classrooms.
