Christina M. Heischmidt

Christina Heischmidt (Partner-McLean, VA) contributed her article “How Employers Can Still Foster DEI Post-Harvard” to the April 2024 posting of Bloomberg Law under Practical Guidance. The Supreme Court of the United States dealt a heavy blow to diversity initiatives by ruling that admissions practices at Harvard University and the University of North Carolina, which considered race as a factor in their admissions processes, violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment and Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Christina writes, “Employers need not shelve their diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives. Indeed, employers can and should continue to commit to developing targeted diversity, equity and inclusion in hiring practices and other programs within the workplace that directly benefit all employees … Despite this setback to DEI overall, employers can continue to implement programs and foster DEI through a number of ways.”