People and organizations that offer scholarships to students should have the choice to make race a requirement.

They don’t have to bar other races, but if they choose to, I think this is the right thing to do.

In a perfect world every student would have an equal education and the ability to pay for college, but this isn’t a fair world.

Not all students have the money to pay for college, especially those that are poor minorities.

Here at Cerritos College, there are a number of scholarships available only to certain races. Sometimes it can be discouraging to find out that you aren’t qualified because of your race, but then again, we should respect the scholarship makers’ decisions.

Giving scholarships based on race is essentially the right of the givers to choose to help a student of a certain race by paying for their education.

These scholarships are not encouraging racism, they are merely the result of history and the preferences of the people that give them.

According to Finaid.org founder Mark Kantrowitz, in 2011, the amount of private scholarships that Caucasians received was disproportionately more than other minorities.

In his report, The Distribution of Grants and Scholarships based by Race, Kantrowitz showed that Caucasians won about $1.89 billion from private scholarships whereas all other minorities combined won about $1.0 billion in private scholarship funding.

Not all incoming college students have had the best public education available. Those in poor communities are mostly at a disadvantage when it comes to getting the necessary programs and funding to help excel in school.

Race is going to be something we can’t just erase from the face of the earth.

Even the government uses race to make data reports on population, health, and other important statistics.

Who we are, especially when it comes down to race. It should be something that is embraced and not taken for granted.

If you can get a scholarship for who you are, then by all means, take advantage of those who are willing to help you.

All scholarships, even those with race requirements, are important because they help close a gap for minority students who are at a disadvantage and need the extra help when paying for school.