The Lyndon Baines Johnson Department of Education Building pictured on Nov. 25, 2024. The Office for Civil Rights is investigating the University of Alabama at Birmingham for allegedly offering “impermissible race-based scholarships” and engaging in “race-based segregation.” (Shauneen Miranda/States Newsroom)
The U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights (OCR) changed a Friday press release on Monday morning to say that the University of Alabama at Birmingham is under investigation by the OCR for allegedly offering “impermissible race-based scholarships” and engaging in “race-based segregation.”
The press release originally said the University of Alabama was under investigation. The release was changed to say UAB at 7:30 a.m. Central Time on Monday.
No explanation for the change was given. The press office at the department is “temporarily closed,” according to its outgoing voicemail message on Monday morning. Legal counsel at UAB declined to comment on the investigation Monday morning citing attorney-client privilege, and referred comment to the communications department. Multiple messages left with the UAB communications department were not immediately returned on Monday morning.
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The federal office did not relay a specific allegation or allegations against UAB. A list of undergraduate scholarships offered at UAB does not include any with explicit racial components.
One scholarship, the Kappa Delta Chapter of Omega Psi Phi Fraternity Memorial Endowed Fund, is run by a National Pan-Hellenic Council whose selection committee is composed of members of UAB’s Black Alumni Network. The scholarship gives preference to underrepresented students with financial need but does not make the race of an applicant a condition.
UAB is one of seven universities facing the allegations. The federal office also accused 45 other universities of engaging in “race-exclusionary practices in their graduate programs.”
“Students must be assessed according to merit and accomplishment, not prejudged by the color of their skin. We will not yield on this commitment,” U.S. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon said in a press release.
Supporters of the programs said they do not engage in preferences but expose people to the diversity of American society.
“Let me also note I’m a white man,” said Sean Atchison, a University of Alabama student who testified against what became the state’s ban on publicly-funded DEI programs and “divisive concepts” in March 2024. “I’m from south Alabama. I’m from the middle of nowhere. I’ve never, ever felt oppressed by a DEI program. I’ve never felt threatened nor hurt. I feel educated. I feel stronger than ever and more confident in my ability to get a job that will benefit the long term future of this state than ever before.”
A group of UAB’s students and UA professors sued the state of Alabama in January over the new law The plaintiffs — three students enrolled at the UAB; three professors working at the UA and the NAACP’s Alabama chapter — allege SB 129, sponsored by Sen. Will Barfoot, R-Pike Road and passed last year, violates their First and Fourteenth Amendment rights, describing it as vague, discriminatory, and a barrier to free expression.
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