Duke Law School is making headlines for its shocking push toward prioritizing diversity over merit. In the wake of the Supreme Court’s decisive ruling against affirmative action in college admissions, many institutions, including Duke, are still entrenched in the outdated practice of selecting candidates based on race or ethnicity.
Just this week, Duke Law’s publication aimed at aspiring legal scholars was exposed for encouraging applicants to pound out diversity statements as a condition for joining their ranks. This is not just a recommendation; it’s a directive that signals a troubling trend in legal education.
The prestigious Duke Law Journal—founded in 1951—would never have suggested that students wax poetic about their Asian American “privilege” or being a “Middle Eastern Jewish woman” just to secure a spot in its editorial team. Yet, the information packet leaked this week shows that such topics are now front and center in their application process.
In a frankly bizarre approach, Duke Law’s packet explicitly urges applicants from so-called “underrepresented or marginalized groups” to share how their backgrounds have shaped their perspectives and experiences. This is not just casual advice; it’s a roadmap for how to succeed in their evaluation system, which rewards personal identity narratives over legal acumen.
Under the guise of inclusiveness, candidates are instructed to highlight their contributions to “diverse communities”—suggesting that their worth hinges on their race rather than their qualifications. Indeed, the first criterion on how personal statements are graded centers on how a student’s perspective can align with Duke Law Journal’s mission of promoting diverse viewpoints in the legal sphere.
The rhetoric emerging from these applications is telling. One applicant claims their voice will combat the “lack of diversity” at Duke Law. Another discusses the need for Asian American leaders who “reflect our experiences.” Yet another touts a supposed privilege tied to their identity as a daughter of immigrants. This push towards identity-centric narratives is emblematic of a broader effort to manipulate representation in academia.
This troubling trend doesn’t stop at Duke. Institutions like Harvard’s law journal are also implicated, with reports surfacing that certain decisions are made based on an applicant’s race rather than the merit of their work. It’s clear that a narrative is being enforced across elite legal circles, sidelining traditional values of scholarship in favor of identity politics.
Duke Law Journal’s application process exemplifies the systematic undermining of fair and equal treatment in the legal profession. The biases at play are alarming and pose a threat to the integrity of legal education. Applicants should be evaluated on merit, not a checklist of identity criteria. It’s time to demand accountability from our educational institutions and reject this new norm of diversity at the expense of excellence.
