A federal court in the US has prohibited the Donald Trump administration from forcing public universities in 17 states to hand over large amounts of data on students' race and gender. This is reported by Reuters, citing a court decision in Boston, writes UNN.
Details
This refers to a new requirement from the US Department of Education, which wanted to obtain seven years of data to check whether universities had stopped considering race in admissions after the 2023 US Supreme Court decision. However, Judge F. Dennis Saylor IV ruled that the agency acted too hastily and chaotically, without considering the risks to universities.
What the court decided
The judge agreed that the Department of Education formally has the right to request such data, but criticized the way the new requirement was implemented. In his assessment, universities were not given enough time and explanations, and the process itself took place against the backdrop of staff reductions in the structure responsible for educational statistics.
New York Attorney General Letitia James said after the court's decision that educational institutions should not "frantically collect years of sensitive information" to comply with what she called an arbitrary federal demand. The US Department of Education has not yet publicly commented on the decision.