U-M, U. of Cape Town to host affirmative action symposium

While the United States and South Africa are vastly different countries, they share similar challenges as they confront the compelling need to further diversity in higher education despite significant social, economic and political barriers.

Ndebele (Photo courtesy Office Of The Vice President for Communications)

Higher education and judicial leaders, scholars and analysts of each country will examine the similarities, differences and lessons to be learned April 14-15, when U-M and the University of Cape Town, South Africa, host a two-day international symposium entitled, "Affirmative Action in Higher Education: The United States and South Africa."

At the symposium, each will learn from the other in panel presentations and extended panel-audience discourse.

The symposium will be co-convened by David Featherman, professor of psychology and sociology, research professor and out-going director of the Institute for Social Research; Marvin Krislov, vice president and general counsel; and James Levinsohn, the J. Ira and Nicki Harris Family Professor of Public Policy and associate dean of the Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy.

"Affirmative action in South Africa is part of profound transformations of its core institutions following apartheid," Featherman says. "It is intimately tied to achieving social justice under the South African constitution and not just diversity, to pursuing world-class excellence as well as equal opportunity."

Mokgoro (Photo courtesy Office Of The Vice President for Communications)

Levinsohn, who has been teaching workshops at the University of Cape Town for the last six years, says, "Like the U.S., South Africa is implementing affirmative action programs in both higher education and in the labor market more generally. In South Africa, though, the programs are affirmative for the vast majority, not a minority, and seem more a part of a larger social transformation. That said, there are real challenges in South Africa as there are here, and sharing views and ideas is going to be exciting."

Principal symposium presenters include William G. Bowen, president of the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation; Nancy Cantor, chancellor and president of Syracuse University; Mary Sue Coleman, U-M president; Charlayne Hunter-Gault, bureau chief and correspondent, CNN, Johannesburg, South Africa; Michael McPherson, president of the Spencer Foundation; Yvonne Mokgoro, justice of the Constitutional Court of South Africa (South Africa's highest court); and Njabulo Ndebele, eminent author and, as vice-chancellor, the highest ranking official of the University of Cape Town.

Hunter-Gault, the first African American woman to graduate from the University of Georgia, also will present an associated lecture entitled "From the Jim Crow South to South Africa: A Journalist's Journey" at noon April 14.

The symposium, which is free and open to the public, will convene 3-5 p.m. April 14 and 9 a.m.-5:30 p.m. April 15. All sessions, except the Hunter-Gault lecture, will be held in the Law School, Room 100. Panel topics will include:

• "The Challenges Viewed in a Comparative Perspective"

• "The Case for Affirmative Action in Higher Education"

• "Implementation Challenges to Existing Programs"

• "Evaluating the Results of Affirmative Action in Higher Education"

• "The road ahead"

A full list of panelists and detailed information on the symposium program, times and locations are available at http://www.umich.edu/pres/sa/index.html.

The symposium is sponsored by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the Spencer Foundation, Office of the President, Office of the Provost, Law School, Office of the Vice President for Communications, and Office of the Vice President and General Counsel.

The Hunter-Gault lecture, which will be held in the Rackham building, is sponsored by the International Institute, Horace H. Rackham School of Graduate Studies, Ford School of Public Policy, and the Center for Afroamerican and African Studies.