Four Race-Based Scholarships at U Connecticut Challenged by Equal Protection Project
“This year, the nonprofit Equal Protection Project has sharply stepped up its campaign of anti-discrimination complaints.” (The Hartford Courant)
“This year, the nonprofit Equal Protection Project has sharply stepped up its campaign of anti-discrimination complaints.”
So writes The Hartford Courant, one of the major newspapers in Connecticut, regarding a case EPP filed on May 28, 2025, against the University of Connecticut (UConn). EPP now has challenged over 400 programs and scholarships at over 100 colleges and universities.
From the Civil Rights Complaint against UConn:
We bring this civil rights complaint against the University of Connecticut (“UConn”), a public university, for discrimination in four (4) scholarships based on race, color, and/or national origin, in violation of Title VI and the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.
UConn has a strong commitment to Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Justice (DEIJ).2 As expressed in its Mission Statement: “We aim to support diversity, equity, and inclusion through offering support for success for people of all backgrounds.” As set forth below, this DEIJ commitment has resulted in the implementation of discriminatory programs at the university. [image omitted]
The scholarships listed below are currently offered to UConn students and applicants for admission, according to the UConn website, and violate Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (“Title VI”) and its implementing regulations3 by illegally excluding students based on their race, color or national origin. Because UConn is a public university, these discriminatory scholarships also violate the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.
Each of the scholarships listed below are available for the 2025-2026 school year, according to the UConn website (discriminatory requirement in bold):1. Bryan K. and Alice M. Pollard Scholarship
Link: https://clas.uconn.edu/scholarships/
Archived Link: http://archive.today/mMauW
Discriminatory Requirement: “Applicants must have overcome obstacles such as socioeconomic or educational disadvantage, be members of underrepresented groups at the University, including students of color, or have experience living or working in diverse environments.”6 The Bryan K. and Alice M. Pollard Scholarship violates Title VI because it automatically makes students of color eligible but requires students who are not ‘of color’ to show an additional qualifying factor — a form of government-imposed barrier prohibited under equal protection principles. N.C. ex rel. Chu v. Rosa, No. 1:24-cv-00075-DNH-CFH, 2024 WL 4870487, at *3-4 (N.D.N.Y. Nov. 22, 2024).
2.Dietetics Program Diversity Scholarship
Link: https://undergraduate.cahnr.uconn.edu/resources-students/scholarships/
Archived Link: http://archive.today/eHP0E
Discriminatory Requirement: “priority given to candidates of an ethnic or racial background which is underrepresented at UCONN.”3. Philo T. Pritzkau Fund
Link: https://scholarships.education.uconn.edu/the-philo-t-pritzkau-fund/
Archived Link: http://archive.today/dDpwR
Discriminatory Requirement: “This fund was established by Dr. Philo T. Pritzkau, emeritus faculty member of the Neag School of Education, to provide financial support for graduate students enrolled in the School. Priority consideration will be given to African American, Hispanic American and Native American students.”4. Sidney P. Marland Jr. Fund for Educational Leadership
Link: https://scholarships.education.uconn.edu/sidney-p-marland-jr-fund-for-educational-leadership/
Archived Link: http://archive.today/ICwNj
Discriminatory Requirement: “The award provides scholarships for minority4 undergraduate and graduate students in Educational Leadership.”***
UConn’s explicit race, color, and/or national origin scholarships are presumptively invalid, and since there is no compelling government justification for such invidious discrimination, UConn’s offering, promotion, and administration of these programs violates state and federal civil rights statutes and constitutional equal protection guarantees.
We then ask OCR to open an investigation and impose appropriate remedies.
The Hartford Courant (syndicated by MSN) covered the story:
“That racially discriminatory scholarships exist at a major public university is disheartening. It is time for higher education everywhere to focus on the inherent worth and dignity of every student rather than categorizing students based on identity groups,” according to William A. Jacobson, founder of the campaign….
This year, the nonprofit Equal Protection Project has sharply stepped up its campaign of anti-discrimination complaints. Since January it has gone to the Office of Civil Rights to contest scholarships at the University of Oregon, the University of Alabama, the University of Nebraska, Drake University, Bowdoin College, the University of South Carolina and about 15 others.
On Wednesday, the organization announced that it’s challenging the legality of four UConn scholarship programs. UConn said late Wednesday that it had not yet gotten a copy of the complaint or been told which funds it involves.
“Generally speaking, UConn continually reviews its scholarship and financial aid criteria against current legal requirements and adjusts as needed to ensure compliance,” UConn spokeswoman Stephanie Reitz said. “Some such scholarship funds are currently paused following the recent Dear Colleague letter and other related federal guidance, and UConn is working with donors and departments to make any necessary revisions.”….
“We are asking UConn to live up to the law and its own rules, and remove the discriminatory eligibility barriers it has erected,” the organization said in a statement. “Racial and ethnic discrimination are wrong and unlawful no matter which race or ethnicity is targeted or benefits. All applicants are entitled to equal treatment without regard to race, color, or national origin.”
In February, Jacobson told ProPublica that his organization opposes any discrimination, saying “If there are programs that exclude Black students, we want the department to go after that, but I am not aware of such programs.”
The CT Insider also covered the filing:
The Equal Protection Project, a nonprofit group opposing race-based education policies, has brought a barrage of civil rights complaints against higher education institutions in recent months, contesting the legality of scholarships intended for minority groups, school-administered programs for students of color and other initiatives that aim to promote racial diversity.
Its latest target is Connecticut’s flagship university.
The group’s website says it filed a federal civil rights complaint against UConn on Wednesday, asking the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights to open a formal investigation. The Equal Protection Project — part of the Legal Insurrection Foundation, a Rhode Island-based free speech organization — accuses UConn of violating civil rights laws in its offering of four specific scholarships, including those which give priority to students that are members of minority and underrepresented groups at the university…
According to its website, the Equal Protection Project aims to combat racism and discrimination “perpetrated in the name of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion and the equity agenda.” The group has also targeted schools such as the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Fordham University over alleged discrimination.
“We respectfully ask that the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights promptly open a formal investigation, impose such remedial relief as the law permits for the benefit of those who have been illegally excluded from UConn’s various scholarships based on discriminatory criteria, and ensure that all ongoing and future scholarships and programming at UConn comports with the Constitution and federal civil rights laws,” according to the complaint filed Wednesday.
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Comments
Easy workaround. I doubt that there is an objection to helping those who come from the lower income tier. Blacks living in the suburbs are doing better economically than blacks living in the big cities, such as Hartford, Waterbury, New Haven, or Bridgeport. Those cities have a lot of poor people. Offer the scholarships, regardless of race, to graduates of high schools from Hartford, Waterbury, New Haven, or Bridgeport.
May not work if the enforcers use the “disparate impact” rule for discrimination.
I am reminded of Ron Suskind’s book, A Hope in the Unseen: an American Odyssey from the Inner City to the Ivy League. It tells the story of Cedric Jennings, a student in a Washington DC disaster of a high school. Cedric Jennings decided to not follow the path of his fellow students, and study. He worked very hard in math.
As a result, he was admitted to a MIT summer program for minority high school students about to start their senior years in high school. Jennings found out that, coming from an inner-city high school, he was the outlier. The other students in the program came from middle class backgrounds and from suburban high schools. College graduate parents. His father was a dope addict who spent years in prison; his mother a hard-working government clerk. Jennings was way behind the other students. Though he worked very hard that summer, he was not recommended for admission to MIT–in contrast to the other students.
The point here is that programs that ostensibly help minority students of poor backgrounds actually help more minority students from middle class backgrounds than minority students from poor backgrounds. They help those who need the help the least.
Jennings did get admitted to Brown. Last I read, he was working as a social worker—though he did succeed in a lot of math courses at Brown.
I was curious to see if the EPP had a map of the cases they had brought, but I couldn’t find one. I was mildly curious to see whether the bulk of the racist scholarships might be concentrated in the Union states.