Libertarian vs Authoritarian: Proponents of racial preferences fear that if schools allow objective measures such as high-school grades and standardized test scores to dominate the admissions process, racial diversity on elite campuses will suffer. That’s a possibility, at least in the short run, given that Asian and white students tend to outperform black students academically. But lowering standards to produce more racial balance on the quad isn’t helping black students so much as it’s using them for aesthetic purposes.