Cite as: 505 U. S. 717 (1992)
Syllabus
The policy also has present discriminatory effects, since a much higher percentage of white than of black high school seniors recently scored at or above the minimum necessary to enter a white university. The segregative effect of this standard is especially striking in light of the differences in minimum required entrance scores among the white and black regional universities and colleges with dissimilar programmatic missions, and yet the courts below made little effort to justify those disparities in educational terms or to inquire whether it was practicable to eliminate them. The State's refusal to consider high school grade performance along with ACT scores is also constitutionally problematic, since the ACT's administering organization discourages use of ACT scores alone, the disparity between black and white students' high school grade averages is much narrower than the gap between their average ACT scores, most States use high school grades and other indicators along with standardized test scores, and Mississippi's approach was not adequately justified or shown to be unsusceptible to elimination without eroding sound educational policy. Pp. 733-738. (b) The District Court's treatment of the widespread duplication of programs at the historically black and historically white Mississippi universities is problematic for several reasons. First, it can hardly be denied that such duplication represents a continuation of the "separate but equal" treatment required by the prior dual system, and yet the court's holding that petitioners could not establish a constitutional defect shifted the burden of proof away from the State in violation of Brown II, supra, at 300, and its progeny. Second, implicit in the court's finding of "unnecessary" duplication is the absence of any educational justification and the fact that some, if not all, duplication may be practically eliminated. Finally, by treating this issue in isolation, the court failed to consider the combined effects of unnecessary duplication with other policies in evaluating whether the State had met its constitutional duty. Pp. 738-739. (c) Mississippi's 1981 mission assignments scheme has as its antecedents the policies enacted to perpetuate racial separation during the de jure period. When combined with the differential admission practices and unnecessary program duplication, it is likely that the mission designations interfere with student choice and tend to perpetuate the segregated system. On remand, the court should inquire whether it would be practicable and consistent with sound educational practices to eliminate any such discriminatory effects. Pp. 739-741. (d) Also on remand, the court should inquire and determine whether the State's retention and operation of all eight higher educational institutions in an attempt to bring itself into constitutional compliance actually affects student choice and perpetuates the de jure system,
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