Civil rights group challenges university mentoring program for excluding white students
The Equal Protection Project (EPP) filed a complaint against the University of Virginia, alleging that its BIPOC Mentoring Program discriminates against white students by restricting participation to students of color.
EPP claims that this program violates both Title VI and the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.
A civil rights legal group recently brought a complaint against the University of Virginia (UVA) for allegedly implementing a program that discriminated against white students.
The Equal Protection Project (EPP) filed the complaint on Oct. 1 to the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights.
EPP’s complaint asserts that the University of Virginia’s School of Education and Human Development (EHD) launched the “BIPOC Mentoring Program” explicitly for students of color.
The complaint details how, according to the EHD website, participants must identify as Black, Indigenous, or people of color (BIPOC), and mentors must share this background.
The application asked students to specify their race or ethnicity and “indicate [their] interest in having an alumni mentor of Color … in the 2024-2025 academic year.”
“The BIPOC Mentoring Program violates Title VI because it conditions eligibility for participation on a student’s race, ethnicity and skin color,” EPP’s complaint concludes. “And, because UVA is a public university, its creation, sponsorship, promotion and hosting of this discriminatory program also violates the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.”
“We’re not seeking money for ourselves,” said William A. Jacobson, EPP’s founder. “We’re not seeking legal fees for ourselves. We’re seeking to change discriminatory behavior.”
“Just as it would be a violation of the university’s rules to have a whites-only mentoring program, it’s a violation of the rules to have a non-whites-only program,” Jacobson continued, according to 29News. “The university needs to be race-neutral in its educational and related programming.”
“Our hope is that the University of Virginia senior administration will look at this and recognize that it’s indefensible and not want to fight a losing battle, and therefore will look at it and change the behavior and open the program up,” Jacobson concluded.
The EPP has filed several other civil rights complaints alleging discriminatory university practices, which include allegations against Fordham University, the University of California, Berkeley, and Indiana University.
In total, the group has filed more than 30 complaints, of which most have been successful. “At least half of the schools have changed their discriminatory practices in response to our complaints,” says Jacobson.
“The Equal Protection Project is devoted to the fair treatment of all persons without regard to race or ethnicity,” EPP’s website states. “Our guiding principle is that there is no ‘good’ form of racism. The remedy for racism never is more racism.”
Campus Reform has contacted the University of Virginia and the Equal Protection project for comment. This article will be updated accordingly.
