That sounds good — until you realize that Hispanics made up only 5 percent of the applicant pool, African Americans 7 percent, and Native Americans 0.5 percent.

And that's a problem – until you realize that Champaign County is 2.90% Hispanic or Latino, 11.16% Black or African American, and 0.24% Native American. The applicant pool for Uni outperforms two of the three aforementioned minority groups. If you include another minority group, Asians, the applicant pool outperforms three of four minority groups as Asians make up 26% of the Uni student population yet only account for 6.45% of the population of Champaign County.

Ignoring demographics, let's consider the merits of affirmative action. According to the Oxford American Dictionary (2nd Ed.), affirmative action is defined as:

an action or policy favoring those who tend to suffer from discrimination, esp. in relation to employment or education; positive discrimination.

Positive discrimination. Can you really make a distinction between negative and positive discrimination? How positive is it that a Native American male is admitted to a college over an Asian female solely on the basis of race and gender?