The U.S. Department of Education opened an investigation Wednesday into two scholarships it says are exclusionary at the University of Nebraska-Omaha.
The Dreamer’s Pathway Scholarship awarded aid to “students who are DACA or DACA eligible and Nebraska residents who are seeking an undergraduate degree,” and the HDR Scholarship gave preference to “underrepresented minority students,” according to an Education Department news release.
“Neither the Trump Administration’s America first policies nor the Civil Right Act of 1964’s prohibition on national origin discrimination permit universities to deny our fellow citizens the opportunity to compete for scholarships because they were born in the United States,” Acting Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights Craig Trainor said in the news release.
A UNO spokesperson said the school would cooperate with the investigation.
“We continually evaluate our scholarships to ensure compliance with state and federal law,” a UNO statement said. “Although we have no comment on the specifics of the investigation, we will fully cooperate with the Department of Education.”
The Flatwater Free Press reported that the Dreamer’s Pathway Scholarship is no longer linked on UNO’s scholarship website, and instead goes to the Forward Together scholarship. The HDR scholarship no longer mentions the preference for underrepresented minority students.
The Legal Insurrection Foundation’s Equal Protection Project submitted the complaint, which included four other universities in the U.S.
“Discrimination against American-born students must not be tolerated,” William Jacobson, founder of the project, said in the news release.
UNO was included in an earlier investigation in March of schools that partnered with the PhD project, a nonprofit supporting underrepresented students earning a doctorate in business.
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