Some states have adopted percentage plans in recent years—where a certain percentage of high school students are automatically accepted into the state universities—as a substitute for affirmative action. However, in every instance, the states are doing the same or worse in bringing about campus diversity than they were prior to the elimination of affirmative action.

That’s the conclusion of detailed 115-page draft report by the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights titled “Beyond Percentage Plans: The Challenge of Equal Opportunity in Higher Education.”

After examining percentage plans in California, Texas and Florida, the commissioners immediately went to the heart of the issue: “Can percentage plans achieve the goal of equal education opportunity? Based on the analysis performed here, the answer unfortunately is no.”

They conclude, “Percentage plans alone do not improve diversity by reaching underrepresented minority groups and will only have their desired effect if affirmative action and other supplemental recruitment, admissions, and academic support programs remain in place.”

Percentage plans were adopted after affirmative action programs had been eliminated at the state level. In California, voters amended the state constitution in 1996 by passing Proposition 209.

That same year, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals—which has jurisdiction over Texas, Louisiana and Mississippi—ruled in Hopwood v. State of Texas that race or ethnicity could not be used as an admissions criterion.

In 1999, Florida Gov. Jeb Bush signed Executive Order 99-281 banning the use of race or ethnicity in university admissions.

California’s Board of Regents adopted a plan guaranteeing admission in the University of California system to the top 4 percent of students in California high schools, provided they meet all other admission requirements.

Texas’ percentage plans guarantees high school graduates in the top 10 percent of their class admission to the public college or university of their choice.

And Florida assures admission to one of its universities to 20 percent of graduating seniors. But like California, it did not match Texas’ provision that the student could select any state university of his or her choosing.

Asian-Americans were the only underrepresented group that made gains in California.

“The preponderance of Asian Pacific Americans and whites in the UC system and its campuses hide, however, the subtle dwindling in the enrolled proportions of Hispanic, black and Native Americans—the underrepresented minority groups,” the staff report found. “The UC system had 16 percent Hispanics in 1995-96, but has had only 12 to 14 percent thereafter. It had 4 percent blacks in 1995-96, but has often had only 3 percent since then. It had 1.1 percent Native Americans in 1995-96, but only 0.5 to 1.0 percent in the ensuing school years.”

The problem was even more acute at the Berkeley and Los Angeles flagship campuses. While people of color had been represented in the 26 to 30 percent range, that percentage later slid to 16 and 17 percent.

A similar problem was encountered by the state of Texas’ flagship university.

“Outlawing race-conscious affirmative action programs in higher education in Texas had a negative impact on minority enrollment at the University of Texas-Austin,” the report stated. “Between 1996, the year that the courts handed down the Hopwood decision, and 1997, minority enrollment at UT-Austin declined for both blacks and Hispanics.”

Of the three states studied, Florida did perhaps the best in maintaining the level of Blacks enrolled in college. Even those results were mixed. At Florida State University, for example, the percentage of African-Americans increased from 10.2 percent in the 1999-2000 school year, the last one under affirmative action, to 10.7 percent the following year, to 11.8 percent for 2001-2002.

At the more prestigious University of Florida, Black enrollment increased from its pre-ban year of 9.6 percent in 1999-2000 to 11.6 percent the following year before dropping sharply to 6.9 percent in 2001-02.

Overall, enrollment of all people of color stood at 36.9 percent in 2001-2002, the same level it was in 1999-2000. For African-Americans, enrollment was up one-tenth of a percent to 15.9 percent over that same period.

“Overall, the population of each minority group in the first-time student population differed minimally between the pre-race ban and post-race ban years,” the report observed. “This finding is particularly disheartening for blacks, who made up between 15.8 and 16 percent of [students enrolled in state universities] but 21.2 percent in the 1999-2000 high school class.”

Contrary to popular belief, this poor record of college matriculation is no fault of parents.

“Americans generally view higher education as necessary for successful careers,” the Civil Rights Commission report noted. “Research shows that black and Hispanic parents stress the importance of higher education to their children more than white parents.”