Opinion: Now that affirmative action is banned, the way to level the field is one Black student at a time

Protesters gather outside the Supreme Court as the justices heard arguments for and against banning affirmative action in college admissions, in October 2022. As the executive director of Black College Success — a community-based nonprofit that provides academic pathways to colleges and universities for hundreds of Black students in South Los Angeles — I’m forced to reckon with the difficulty of improving such statistics. You should know that 75% of Black students from the Los Angeles Unified School District don’t enroll in and 85% don’t graduate from a four-year college or university. We’re not only trying to shatter the boundaries Black students from South Los Angeles face in gaining access to college, but to also help make clear the transformative opportunity that college offers their families financially for the future. At times, the students’ need for mentoring is far greater than our capacity, so we partner with in-school resources, such as the newly created Black Student Achievement Program, and lock arms with other nonprofits like Brotherhood Crusade, 826LA, Los Angeles Urban League and others that can help us provide writing workshops, access to advanced courses and a range of extracurricular activities, stipends for summer internships, career guidance and scholarships.