US Supreme Court rules race can no longer be considered a factor in university admission

The cases concerned admissions at Harvard and the University of North Carolina (UNC). The court's conservative majority ruled 6-3 against UNC and 6-2 against Harvard. The justices sided with an organisation called Students for Fair Admissions, founded by a conservative activist, Edward Blum. The group argued before the court last October that Harvard's race-conscious admissions policy violated Title VI the 1964 Civil Rights Act, which bars discrimination based on race, colour or national origin. Affirmative action is one of the most contentious issues in US education. It first made its way into policy in the 1960s, and has been defended as a measure to increase diversity.