Page:Fisher v. University of Texas at Austin, 579 U.S. (2016) (slip opinion).pdf/33

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admitted to UT under the holistic, race-neutral process.

“To implement the Proposal the University included a student’s race as a component of the PAI score, beginning with applicants in the fall of 2004.” Fisher I, 570 U. S., at ___ (slip op., at 4). “The University asks students to clas­sify themselves from among five predefined racial catego­ries on the application.” Ibid. “Race is not assigned an explicit numerical value, but it is undisputed that race is a meaningful factor.” Ibid. UT decided to use racial prefer­ences to benefit African-American and Hispanic students because it considers those groups “underrepresented minorities.” Supp. App. 25a; see also App. 445a–446a (defining “underrepresented minorities” as “Hispanic[s] and African Americans”). Even though UT’s classroom study showed that more classes lacked Asian-American students than lacked Hispanic students, Supp. App. 26a, UT deemed Asian-Americans “overrepresented” based on state demographics, 645 F. Supp. 2d, at 606; see also ibid. (“It is undisputed that UT considers African-Americans and Hispanics to be underrepresented but does not con­sider Asian-Americans to be underrepresented”).

Although UT claims that race is but a “factor of a factor of a factor of a factor,” id., at 608, UT acknowledges that “race is the only one of [its] holistic factors that appears on the cover of every application,” Tr. of Oral Arg. 54 (Oct. 10, 2012). “Because an applicant’s race is identified at the front of the admissions file, reviewers are aware of it throughout the evaluation.” 645 F. Supp. 2d, at 597; see also id., at 598 (“[A] candidate’s race is known throughout the application process”). Consideration of race therefore pervades every aspect of UT’s admissions process. See App. 219a (“We are certainly aware of the applicant’s race. It’s on the front page of the application that’s being read [and] is used in context with everything else that’s part of the applicant’s file”). This is by design, as UT considers its use of racial classifications to be a benign form of “social