Can a job application requirement to have a college degree be discriminatory?

- “College is a biggest training system for careers in the country and a college credential is your
ticket into a career” said Van Der Werf. “ having said all of that, it’s really important that you have
an idea of what you want to do.”

“Bachelor’s degree required.”

For many managers, it’s almost automatic to specify a four-year degree requirement in a job
listing. Why? Because employers assume that only the best and the brightest complete their
college education—and they want the best and the brightest on their teams.

However, this assumption doesn’t take two crucial points into account.

First, candidates can acquire skills and knowledge through a variety of different channels,
including apprenticeships, on-the-job training, and work experience, as well as online courses
and webinars from reputable institutions.

Second, not every job requires a degree. As The Wall Street Journal reports, the current trend
of requiring a degree for almost every job is “degree inflation”—or employers demanding a
college degree for middle-skills jobs that didn’t require one until recently. In fact, a 2017 study
showed that 61 percent of employers had rejected candidates who possessed the required
experience and skills simply because they didn’t have a degree.

When is a degree requirement discriminatory?

If a degree requirement is a covert way to screen out candidates from a certain protected group,
it’s likely to be classified as employment discrimination. For example, according to Insider
Higher Ed, approximately 20 percent more Caucasian and Asian students than Black and
Hispanic students complete their college education. So, if an employer doesn’t want to hire
Black or Hispanic employees, it could use a degree requirement to screen out candidates from
these groups—but that would be discriminatory.

At the same time, if an employer requires a college degree and that requirement has the
unintended effect of disqualifying candidates from a protected group, it’s also discriminatory.
Let’s say an employer is looking for a developer, and among the applicants are a Caucasian
candidate with a degree and a Black candidate with work experience and a certificate that
together are equivalent to that degree. If the Caucasian is hired purely because they have a
degree, that could be interpreted as discriminatory.

Establish unbiased hiring practices

If you want to avoid discriminatory hiring practices, ask yourself whether a job really requires a
college degree. For instance, physicians, lawyers, and architects need proof of a considerable
amount of education and a certain skill level, so they need advanced degrees.

Other jobs—for example developer or marketer—can be filled by candidates who have acquired
college-level skills and knowledge via less traditional methods such as work experience, on the
job training, and online courses.

Yet other jobs—mainly middle-skills jobs—don’t really require a college degree. To assess
whether a role requires a degree or not, look at the tasks a candidate would need to perform
and evaluate if they can only be completed by someone who has complete their college
education. If not, you might want to consider leveraging skills tests during the hiring process to
see which candidates possess the required abilities.

Knowing whether or not a job truly requires a degree is all about understanding the
responsibilities associated with that role. So, take the time to discover which attributes a hire
would need to be successful, and adapt your hiring process accordingly.

At Kelly, we believe everyone should reach their full potential in work and in life. If you like this
article and want related content on retaining, managing, recruiting, and hiring employees, visit
our business resource center.
Whether or not a hiring requirement is discriminatory depends on its intent and its effect. Some
employers adopt screening tests or criteria with the purpose of screening out certain applicants.
For example, imposing a strength test would have the effect of screening out larger numbers of
women. If an employer's intent is to discriminate, and its hiring criteria are simply a
smokescreen for this true purpose, then the employer is discriminating.

But even if an employer has no intent to discriminate, its hiring criteria may have that effect. If a
selection test or requirement has a disproportionate affect on applicants in a particular protected
category, that might be illegal discrimination. The key is whether the requirement is truly
necessary to do the job. For example, a strength test might screen out disproportionate
numbers of female applicants, but might also be necessary for a job as a firefighter, construction
worker, or logger.

An employer whose screening test or requirement has a disparate impact on a protected group
must show that the requirement is job-related and consistent with business necessity. This is
intended to be a difficult hurdle, but not an impossible one. For example, an attorney needs to
pass the bar exam to practice law, so requiring applicants for an associate position at a law firm
to be admitted to the bar would meet this test. Similarly, many skills tests would pass legal
muster, as long as the exam tested skills that truly were necessary to do the job.

Degree requirements are more slippery, in part because it isn't clear exactly what particular
skills, aptitudes, or abilities a degree confers (unless a particular degree is required for
licensing, like a law degree or medical degree generally is). And, degree requirements often do
have a disparate impact against African American and Latino applicants.

In fact, the very first Supreme Court case to recognize disparate impact discrimination cases
involved a degree requirement. Before federal law prohibited job discrimination, the Duke Power
Company had a segregated workforce; African Americans could be employed only in its low
paying labor department. After the law changed, Duke had to drop its overt discrimination.
Instead, it imposed the new requirement that all applicants for hire or transfer to any other
department had to have a high school diploma or a satisfactory score on two IQ tests. The Court
found that these requirements had the effect of continuing the company's discriminatory
practices. Because the requirements did not measure any job-related skill, they were found to
be illegal.

Your Board has expressed a nondiscriminatory reason for its new requirement. But a court
would look at whether it really is necessary to have a college degree to do every job at your
company. The variety of jobs employees hold is going to be a major strike against the
requirement: It seems pretty evident that someone can stuff envelopes, answer phones,
manage databases, and do a wide variety of other work without a college degree.

And, even if a court were to accept the employer's "role model" argument for certain positions,
an applicant could still win a discrimination lawsuit by showing that there are less discriminatory
alternatives available. For example, an employee might be an even more effective advocate for
staying in school if he or she can share how difficult it has been to succeed without a degree. An
employee who has dropped out might be better able to relate to the decisions facing at-risk kids
and better able to help them make a different choice. In short, if a degree requirement has the
effect of screening out larger numbers of African American and Latino applicants, your employer
will face a very difficult task in trying to justify the disparity.

College graduates earned 80% more per week than high school graduates, with The Bureau of
Labor Statistics reporting that Americans with a bachelor’s degree have median weekly
earnings of $1,173, compared to $712 for those with only a high school diploma.

Degree requirements lead to less diversity

Recruiters use software, known as Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS), which I discuss in detail
in a previous article. ATS collect, sort, and filter job applicants who apply through an online form.

They use this tool because the average job post receives 250 applications today, and they need
a way to save time filtering down candidates.

Sometimes, online application forms will feature “knockout questions,” like “Where did you
graduate from?” “What year did you graduate?” and “What did you major in?” These are meant
to automatically weed out candidates who don’t meet certain criteria. Whether or not a hiring
requirement is discriminatory depends on its intent and its effect. Some employers adopt screening tests or
criteria with the purpose of screening out certain applicants. For example, imposing a strength test would have
the effect of screening out larger numbers of women. If an employer’s intent is to discriminate, and its hiring
criteria are simply a smokescreen for this true purpose, then the employer is discriminating. But even if an
employer has no intent to discriminate, its hiring criteria may have that effect. If a selection test or requirement
has a disproportionate effect on applicants in a particular protected category, that might be illegal
discrimination. The key is whether the requirement is truly necessary to do the job. For example, a strength test
might screen out disproportionate numbers of female applicants, but might also be necessary for a job as a
firefighter, construction worker, or logger.

An employer whose screening test or requirement has a disparate impact on a protected group
must show that the requirement is job-related and consistent with business necessity. This is
intended to be a difficult hurdle, but not an impossible one. For example, an attorney needs to
pass the bar exam to practice law, so requiring applicants for an associate position at a law firm
to be admitted to the bar would meet this test. Similarly, many skills tests would pass legal
muster, as long as the exam tested skills that truly were necessary to do the job.

Degree requirements are more slippery, in part because it isn’t clear exactly what particular
skills, aptitudes, or abilities a degree confers (unless a particular degree is required for
licensing, like a law degree or medical degree generally is). And, degree requirements often do
have a disparate impact against African American and Latino applicants.

Your Board has expressed a nondiscriminatory reason for its new requirement. But a court
would look at whether it really is necessary to have a college degree to do every job at your
company. The variety of jobs employees hold is going to be a major strike against the
requirement: It seems pretty evident that someone can stuff envelopes, answer phones,
manage databases, and do a wide variety of other work without a college degree.

And, even if a court were to accept the employer’s “role model” argument for certain positions,
an applicant could still win a discrimination lawsuit by showing that there are less discriminatory
alternatives available. For example, an employee might be an even more effective advocate for
staying in school if he or she can share how difficult it has been to succeed without a degree. An
employee who has dropped out might be better able to relate to the decisions facing at-risk kids
and better able to help them make a different choice. In short, if a degree requirement has the
effect of screening out larger numbers of African American and Latino applicants, your employer
will face a very difficult task in trying to justify the disparity.Degree requirements actually lead to
less diversity.
Is animal testing moral?

- The issue of animal experiments is straightforward if we accept that animals have rights: if an
experiment violates the rights of an animal, then it is morally wrong, because it is wrong to violate rights.

Today we have made many advances in the world. A scientific evolution has firmly been set, yet in doing
so we have failed to set moral and ethical boundaries along the journey. The knowledge we have
acquired is remarkable, but with it comes responsibility to use it wisely and ethically. Every day we torture
and kill thousands of animals for our own heartless wants. Animal Testing has been a highly debated and
ongoing topic for many years. The dangers of using animals to test products being made for human uses
is a high risk. Approximately 225 million animals are used for testing every year. Billions have been killed
in the process. ("Questions and Answers About Biomedical Research.”) How can this be allowed? Isn’t it
cruel to use animals to …show more content…
The drugs Oraflex, Selacryn, Zomax, Suprol and Meritol produced such adverse side effects in humans,
including death, that they were removed from the market, though animal experimentation had predicted
them all to be safe. One of the few studies that examined the differences in species reactions found only
a 5-25% connection between harmful effects in people and the results of animal experiments (MFAT).
Also these animals are in an unnatural environment, where they will be under stress. Therefore, they
won't react to the drugs in the same way compared to their potential reaction in a natural environment.
This argument further weakens the validity of animal experimentation. ("Using Animals for Testing: Pros
Versus Cons.") Most tests that look promising fail in human clinical trials. Nine out of ten drugs will fail.
Animal studies do not reliably predict human outcomes. Sometimes drugs that are tested don’t seem
promising and can still end up being a leading drug used by doctors. For example, Lipitor did not seem
promising in animal testing trials but after being requested by a scientist to be tested on a small group of
healthy volunteer humans it was proven and has become a well-used drug by doctors. However, the
opposite has been recorded as well. Nicotine in dogs is a staggering 9.2mg/kg, in pigeons 75mg/kg, and
in rats, 53mg/kg (PETA Facts).So, when animals did not show signs of cancer from smoking, there were
no warning labels on cigarette packaging. (“Frequently Asked Questions | About NEAVS.”) Many people
died during this period of time, due to the fact that animals cannot help properly judge human reactions.
Reactions in animals also vary on gender, breeds, age, weight ranges and ethnic background even within
the same breed, making it impractical and expensive to use animals in product testing. ("Stop Testing
Household Products on Animals - In the spring of 1987, a veterinary lab at the University of California at
Davis was destroyed by a fire that caused $3.5 million in damage. Credit for the fire was claimed by the
Animal Liberation Front, a clandestine international group committed to halting experimentation on
animals. Three years earlier, members of the group invaded the Experimental Head Injury Laboratory at
the University of Pennsylvania where scientists had been engaged in research on head trauma, a
condition which now claims more that 50,000 lives a year. They took videotapes recording the deliberate
and methodical inflicting of severe head injuries on unanesthetized chained baboons. Copies of the
videotape were sent to the media, to University officials, and to government agencies which eventually
suspended federal funds for the experiments.

About 20 million animals are experimented on and killed annually, three-fourths for medical purposes and
the rest to test various products. An estimated eight million are used in painful experiments. Reports show
that at least 10 percent of these animals do not receive painkillers. Animal rights advocates are pressing
government agencies to impose heavy restrictions on animal research. But this growing criticism of
painful experimentation on animals is matched by a growing concern over the threat restrictions on the
use of animals would pose to scientific progress. Whether such experiments should be allowed to
continue has become a matter for public debate.
Those who argue that painful experimentation on animals should be halted, or at least curtailed, maintain
that pain is an intrinsic evil, and any action that causes pain to another creature is simply not morally
permissible. Pointing to the words of the nineteenth-century utilitarian, Jeremy Bentham, animal welfare
advocates claim that the morally relevant question about animals is not "Can they reason? nor Can they
talk? but, Can they suffer ?" And, animals do in fact suffer, and do in fact feel pain. The researcher who
forces rats to choose between electric shocks and starvation to see if they develop ulcers does so
because he or she knows that rats have nervous systems much like humans and feel the pain of shocks
in a similar way. Pain is an intrinsic evil whether it is experienced by a child, an adult, or an animal. If it is
wrong to inflict pain on a human being, it is just as wrong to inflict pain on an animal.

Moreover, it is argued, the lives of all creatures, great and small, have value and are worthy of respect.
This right to be treated with respect does not depend on an ability to reason. An insane person has a right
to be treated with respect, yet he or she may not be able to act rationally. Nor does a right to be treated
with respect rest on being a member of a certain species. Restricting respect for life to a certain species is
to perform an injustice similar to racism or sexism. Like the racist who holds that respect for other races
does not count as much as respect for his or her own race, those who support painful experimentation on
animals assume that respect for other species does not count as much as respect for members of his or
her own species. "Speciesism" is as arbitrarily unjust as racism or sexism. The right to be treated with
respect rests, rather, on a creature's being a "subject of a life," with certain experiences, preferences, and
interests. Animals, like humans, are subjects of a life. Justice demands that the interests of animals be
respected, which includes respect for their interest to be spared undeserved pain.

Finally, animal welfare activists defend their position by countering the claim that halting painful animal
experiments would put an end to scientific progress, with harmful consequences to society. Much animal
experimentation, they say, is performed out of mere curiosity and has little or no scientific merit. Animals
are starved, shocked, burned, and poisoned as scientists look for something that just might yield some
human benefit. In one case, baby mice had their legs chopped off so that experimenters could observe
whether they'd learn to groom themselves with their stumps. In another, polar bears were submerged in a
tank of crude oil and salt water to see if they'd live. And, for those experiments which do have merit, there
exist many non-animal alternatives. It is only out of sheer habit or ease that scientists continue to inflict
pain on animals when, in fact, alternatives exist. And, where alternatives don't exist, the moral task of
science is to discover them.

Those who argue for the continuation of painful experimentation on animals state that society has an
obligation to act in ways that will minimize harm and maximize benefits. Halting or curtailing painful
experimentation on animals would have harmful consequences to society. Indeed, pain is an evil to be
minimized, and scientists do work to minimize pain when possible. Contrary to sensationalistic reports of
animal rights activists, scientists are not a society of crazed, cruel, curiosity seekers. But there are
instances when the use of alternatives, such as painkillers, would interfere with research that promises to
vastly improve the quality and duration of human lives. Animal research has been the basis for new
vaccines, new cancer therapies, artificial limbs and organs, new surgical techniques, and the
development of hundreds of useful products and materials. These benefits to humans far outweigh the
costs in suffering that relatively few animals have had to endure. Society has an obligation to maximize
the opportunities to produce such beneficial consequences, even at the cost of inflicting some pain on
animals.

Furthermore, many argue, while the lives of animals may be deserving of some respect, the value we
place on their lives does not count as much as the value we place on human lives. Human beings are
creatures that have capacities and sensibilities that are much more highly developed than that of animals.
Because humans are more highly developed, their welfare always counts for more than that of animals. If
we had to choose between saving a drowning baby and saving a drowning rat, we would surely save the
baby. Moreover, if we move to consider animals as our moral equals, where do we draw the line?
Technically, any living thing that is not a plant is an animal. Are oysters, viruses, and bacteria also to be
the objects of our moral concern? While we may have a duty to not cause animals needless suffering,
when we are faced with a choice between the welfare of humans and the welfare of animals, it is with
humans that our moral obligation lies.

Others argue that moral rights and principles of justice apply only to human beings. Morality is a creation
of social processes in which animals do not participate. Moral rights and moral principles apply only to
those who are part of the moral community created by these social processes. Since animals are not part
of this moral community, we have no obligations toward them. But we do have moral obligations to our
fellow human beings, which include the duty to reduce and prevent needless human suffering and
untimely deaths, which, in turn, may require the painful experimentation on animals.

Mice or men? Where do our moral obligations lie? The debate over painful experimentation on animals
enjoins us to consider the wrongfulness of inflicting pain and the duty to respect the lives of all creatures,
while also considering our obligations to promote human welfare and prevent human suffering, animals
aside.