While seemingly harsh, does Justice Scalia's observation have merit?

I find Justice Scalia's assertion that minority students can't thrive in an advanced school revolting.
Having said that, I will say this, philosophically:
If some students get to enter into a school not due to their merits, but due to the color of their skin, are they truly being treated equally?

What should happen is students who apply to a university are given an application number and all gender/ethnic/disability information is stripped and admissions personnel are only given a list of accomplishments and that number to make their decision. Like the article says, Texas has a similar law where the top 10% of students from graduating high school classes are guaranteed admission solely based on their grades, which is a good thing.

I think that Scalia took the wrong approach when he said that "it does not benefit African-Americans to get them into the University of Texas, where they do not do well, as opposed to having them go to a less advanced school, a slower-track school, where they do well". Because of course you can make the argument that that is A: not true for all African-American students, and B: also true for every student. Some students just will not excel in college, but to use that argument sheds an unfair light on the current situation as far as minority students are concerned.

Bottom-line: college (and career progression for that matter) should be merit based.

It does seem harsh but what he says is true. It is also the same argument that minority groups used when politicians tried unsuccessfully to merge a majority black state university with my school on a couple of occasions. Seemed logical since the campuses are across the street from each other. It was the minority advocates that refused to go along.