Rutgers University in New Brunswick, New Jersey has deleted four scholarships from its website after being hit with a civil rights complaint on Friday.
The Equal Protection Project (EPP) filed the Aug. 1 complaint with the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights. The complaint argues that the four scholarships violate Title VI of the 1964 Civil Rights Act by giving preference based on race.
The university has since deleted all four of the scholarships from its website. However, the complaint provides archived links for each award: the GEM Fellowship Program, the NACME Renewable Scholarships, the EEOC/General Motors Endowed Scholarship, and the Albert W. Dent Graduate Student Scholarship for minority students.
For instance, the EEOC/General Motors Endowed Scholarship offered preference to “students of underrepresented minorities,” while the GEM Fellowship Program prioritized “underrepresented students.”
Similarly, the NACME Renewable Scholarships required recipients to “Identify as under-represented (African American, American Indian, or Latino) and/or first generation.”
In a statement to The New York Post, the university distanced itself from the scholarships while reiterating its commitment to federal civil rights law.
“The university will closely review the complaint, but based on preliminary information, two of the scholarships are not administered by the university and the remaining two are no longer being awarded,” the statement read.
In a Monday blog post, EPP founder William A. Jacobson responded to the university’s claim, pointing to the complaint’s archived links and screenshots.
“[A]s of the date of our complaint, all of the challenged scholarships were actively promoted on and active according to the Rutgers website (see screenshots and links in Complaint),” he wrote. “It is irrelevant whether Rutgers ‘administered’ the scholarships (though we believe it did) since it promoted them, and the application was made through Rutgers.”
“[W]e are calling on Rutgers to live up to its own set of rules — that shouldn’t be controversial,” Jacobson said in comments provided to Campus Reform.
[RELATED: Yale, AAAP hit with civil rights complaint over racially exclusive fellowship]
The Equal Protection Project has filed similar complaints against Florida State University, Western Michigan University, and the University of Miami.
Campus Reform has contacted Rutgers University for comment. This article will be updated accordingly.
Brendan McDonald is a graduate student pursuing a Master of Theological Studies. He graduated from Thomas More College and is interested in writing and communication.