By Randall Yip, Executive Editor

“This is for myself because they really pissed me off.”

That’s how Nan Zhong explained why he’s suing the University of California after five UC schools denied admission to his son Stanley, a child prodigy hired by Google as an engineer at age of 18.

Zhong’s lawsuit to be filed today accuses both the University of California and the U.S. Department of Education of discrimination against Asian American applicants.

It’s the third lawsuit in recent weeks accusing institutions of higher learning of being biased against Asian American applicants.

On February 3, Students Against Racial Discrimination sued the UC system saying the use of holistic admissions which considers extracurricular activities, socioeconomic background and life experiences in its admissions criteria hurts Asian Americans and White students.

Just a week earlier, the Equal Protection Project sued four Pennsylvania state universities for discriminating because of their participation in a STEM program designed to increase the number of students from underrepresented groups.

Similarly, Zhong named the Department of Education in his lawsuit pointing out the designation of certain colleges as minority serving institutions also hurts Asian American applicants.

Referring to both the Department of Education and the UC system, Zhong told AsAmNews “those people are hurting Asian American kids and they’re actually feeling good about it. I have to stop them.”

In 1996, voters in California passed proposition 209 which banned the use of race or gender in consideration for public employment, contracting and education.

In 2020, UC openly supported Proposition 16, an initiative rejected by voters that would have repealed 209.

“So, they’re not even hiding. They are very out there in the open saying that they want to get rid of Proposition 209,” Zhong said.

Zhong could not find an attorney willing to take his case and has turned to artificial intelligence to write a 290-page complaint to the U.S. District Court Eastern District in Sacramento.

His son Stanley applied to five UC schools- Berkeley, Los Angeles, San Diego, Davis and Santa Barbara. All rejected him.

UC did offer him a spot at UC Merced, but Stanley declined the offer and is instead working fulltime at Google.

“UC possesses the means and opportunity to manipulate the racial composition of its student body under its current “holistic” admissions framework, which has a history of corruption and lacks transparency, independent third-party oversight and accountability,” Zhong’s lawsuit reads.

The lawsuit also states applicants such as his son are harmed by the Department of Education’s through the “denial of equal access to federally funded educational programs, loss of educational opportunities, reputational damage, and emotional distress resulting from the perception that the federal government endorses racial discrimination in higher education.”

AsAmNews reached out to both the University of California and the Department of Education for comment but had not heard back by publication time. We will update this story if they do decide to comment for this story.

“They are hurting other Asian kids, including my future grandkids. I have to stop them,” Zhong concluded.

AsAmNews is published by the non-profit, Asian American Media Inc.

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