Press release, AP, June 30 2004
http://www.cnn.com/2004/EDUCATION/06/30/
louisville.desegregation.ap/index.html A federal judge largely upheld the process used to ensure racial integration in Louisville’s magnet school system. Several parents sued the Louisville School District, claiming that their system of acceptance weighed too heavily on race, and not enough on other factors, such as merit and geography.
This case, according to leading attorneys, was the first since the Supreme Court’s ruling that race could be a factor in the admissions process at the University of Michigan, as long as it wasn’t the deciding factor. U.S. district Judge John Heyburn II ruled along these lines, saying that the school district’s current policy of maintaining a 15 to 50 percent black population in its schools did not constitute a racial quota. Heyburn ordered officials selecting students for the magnet schools to stop sorting applicants as "black male," "black female," "white male" and "white female." This sort of profiling, said Heyburn, would then make race a deciding factor instead of a contributing one. School district officials were elated that their system held up in the courts, and lawyers representing the disgruntled parents said they would appeal the case.
