US Law Week Feb. 2026 Circuit Split Review: Elite Public Schools

Circuit courts have diverged over what is required to trigger strict constitutional scrutiny in equal protection challenges to admissions policies of elite public schools.

Some say a student claiming unconstitutional race bias must only show they were individually harmed by admissions policies favoring certain groups in order to invoke heightened scrutiny. But others say that unless a plaintiff shows that their racial group as a whole was harmed by the policy, then the more demanding level of scrutiny isn’t available.

The circuit split arises from courts trying to determine whether the highest level of constitutional scrutiny or the less demanding ...