. Now it is time to end affirmative action and focus on what is holding down minorities today. Let us turn our sites on poverty, poor family life, poor schooling, for these problems are colorblind, and can hinder an individuals chances for success more than anything else. To equal the opportunity of minorities for employment we should educate and prepare them, not force them into the work force or universities. Guadalupe Quintanilla, the assistant Vice President for Academic Affairs for the University of Houston, stated, "Affirmative action has been distorted and abused. We need to take a second look at it. I think affirmative action has opened a lot of doors, but it has been misrepresented. I'm for opportunity, not special treatment. The majority of people in this country are open-minded and willing to work with people without considering their sex or color. So I think we could do away with set asides" (Dunkel 42). Problems with equality in our work force and universities can not be blamed completely on discrimination. The problem today is colorblind poverty. Affirmative action actually hurts the lower income individual of any minority group. Thomas Sowell, in his 1990 book, Preferential Policies, used an international survey of affirmative action programs to show the consequences. "The benefits of affirmative action went overwhelmingly to people who were already better off., while the poorer members of the same groups either did not gain ground or actually fell further behind" (Richardson 4C). The wealthier neighborhoods have better school systems, which in turn offer greater resources. If we bring equality to our school systems, a rise in minorities in the work force will soon follow. Some universities here in the United States have based enrollment on College Board's and SAT's or ACT's, none of which show intelligence levels. These tests rather show the standards of education that the individu...
