DEI law school accreditation standard finds support in comments
An overwhelming majority of comments received regarding the future of a diversity, equity and inclusion accreditation standard for law schools are strongly in favor of keeping—and perhaps strengthening—the embattled requirement.
In February, the ABA Section of Legal Education and Admissions to the Bar called for comments regarding potentially scrapping Standard 206, which has been suspended since February 2025.
The comment period closed Monday. Of the 49 responses received, 47 supported saving the guidelines. Among those were one comment signed by 266 law professors and members of the legal profession, another from 26 deans and former deans of law schools, and others from the Society of American Law Teachers and the Clinical Legal Education Association.
Several comments stated that if the council repealed the standard, that would “validate ongoing white supremacist attacks” on higher education. Instead, several authors stated, the council should “reject the proposed repeal and instead strengthen Standard 206.”
Only two comments supported the repeal. “Racial preferences corrode the mission of America’s law schools,” wrote Dennis Patterson, a professor at Rutgers University Law School.
As written, Standard 206 requires law schools “demonstrate by concrete action a commitment to diversity and inclusion by providing full opportunities for the study of law and entry into the profession by members of underrepresented groups” and have “a faculty and staff that are diverse with respect to gender, race and ethnicity.”
The section’s council is recognized by the Department of Education as the sole accrediting body for U.S. law schools. It is an independent arm of the ABA for that function. Most jurisdictions require bar applicants to be graduates of an ABA-accredited law school.
The seeds to consider killing the DEI-focused standard stem from the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2023 decision in Students for Fair Admissions v. President and Fellows of Harvard College, which some interpret as barring schools from pursuing diversity.
But several comments stated that DEI initiatives are not illegal, and the proposed elimination of the standard overreaches.
“Nothing in the law requires this action,” wrote the deans and former deans, including Edwin Chemerinsky, dean of the University of California at Berkeley School of Law; Danielle M. Conway, dean of Penn State Dickinson Law; and Michael Waterstone, dean of UCLA School of Law. “Eliminating Standard 206 goes much further than the law requires and creates the very real risk that law schools will abandon commitments to promoting the diversity of a profession with a unique role in advancing a pluralistic democracy.”
Several executive orders early on in the second term of President Donald Trump’s administration took aim at higher education, including one related to accreditation on April 23, 2025, that specifically referenced the council.
In January, Texas became the first state to officially cut ties with the section’s council, and Florida followed suit nine days later. The state supreme courts of Tennessee and Ohio also are reevaluating ABA accreditation.
Meanwhile, the commenting period also ended for proposed changes to Standards 316 and 509, which would allow law schools to count admission via an alternative or nontraditional pathway to count as part of its minimum bar passage rate. Of the comments received, 6 of 7 supported the change.
“Linking licensure compliance to only passing a bar exam would disadvantage schools in states with alternative pathways to licensure,” wrote Tamara Lawson, dean of the University of Washington School of Law. “Broadening the language in these standards to comport with the current reality, that the bar exam is not the only pathway to licensure, just makes practical sense.”
The new pathways, such as those established in recent years in Oregon, Washington, South Dakota, Utah and Nevada, allow graduates from ABA-accredited law schools to earn licensure through supervised practice or a combination of academic and work experience.
The proposed rule changes could be considered at the council’s May 15 meeting.
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