> That would only be fairer if everyone has the same level of access to education up to that point.

So it is the socioeconomic difference that should be addressed, not racial difference.

Isn't it wrong-headed to attempt to derive fairness out of non-fairness? If the level of access to primary and secondary education is highly unequal then why not fix that first?

> Isn't it wrong-headed to attempt to derive fairness out of non-fairness?

While the wording of that sounds very logical, (Isn't is stupid to try to get gold out of not-gold?), it's a pseudologic that has historically been used by the likes of Ayn Rand and other right-wing types to justify inaction. Fairness is always "derived from" unfairness. The pie wasn't divided equally? Then the fair thing to do is to unfairly take pie from the people who were rightly given their larger share. It's theirs, right? They were given it. They played by the rules, and now we want to take pie from some and give it to others? Fairness is only possible when one transcends exactly that line of reasoning.

> If the level of access to primary and secondary education is highly unequal then why not fix that first?

The most naive thing about that remark is that it's precluded by your first remark. The second most naive thing about it is that the way in which this inequality of access works, and the ways in which it can be remedied, should embarrass any speaker who asks "...why not fix that...?" Civil liberties? Just fix it. Traumatic and total devastation of an extant cultural support system by colonization? Just fix it. Centuries of ensuing racism, ethnocentrism, and bigotry reinforcing an association--in both the dominant cultural and economic systems and in the minds of the members of an outgroup--between a race or ethnicity and social unfitness and undesirability? Just fix it first.

No problem. I'll have it on your desk Tuesday.

That should be fixed first, but it's much more complicated. Even if you could fix all systematic issues the poor would still have less access because of poverty, discrimination, and many other forces.

In South Australia, at least, there are a measure of bonus points provided to students from disadvantaged socio-economic backgrounds and rural regions.

this can be corrected for to some extent by weighting exam scores based on school/region/socioeconomic status. that would be fairer and more transparent than the current system used by elite universities in america.

the ability to develop an "interesting" application is of course strongly influenced by family background and finances...