PALO ALTO, California — Stanley Zhong was only 13 years old when he heard from a Google recruiter.
The recruiter reached out in 2019, writing in an email that Google “would love” to discuss software engineering career opportunities with Zhong, according to a 291-page lawsuit he recently filed in Sacramento federal court.
Zhong was already a self-taught programmer by that point and was interested.
“Just to make sure you know, I’m 13 years old,” he responded to the recruiter, a screenshot of his emailed response included in the lawsuit shows.
The recruiter ultimately told Zhong that Google was going to keep his resume for future consideration, due to his age, according to the filing.
Google hired Zhong full-time at age 18 in the fall of 2023.
He was offered the Ph.D.-level position as a recent Palo Alto high school graduate — who had been rejected by 16 out of 18 colleges he applied to, according to Students Who Oppose Racial Discrimination, an organization created by his father, Nan Zhong.
Of the colleges, five were all University of California schools: UC Berkeley, UC Davis, UC Los Angeles, UC San Diego and UC Santa Barbara, the lawsuit says.
Stanley, who’s now 19, and Nan Zhong are suing the University of California for racial discrimination over a pattern of discriminating against “highly qualified Asian-American applicants.”
“What we’re trying to get out of this is a fair treatment for future Asian applicants going forward, including my other kids and my future grandkids,” Nan Zhong said in an interview with KGO-TV, which first reported on the lawsuit.
Stanley and Nan Zhong are representing themselves after multiple parties they contacted declined to take the case or didn’t answer, the complaint notes.
In an email to McClatchy News on February 20, Nan Zhong said the legal entities who responded didn’t specify exact reasons for declining. He said they were given general explanations, such as the parties having “too many cases.”
As a result, they turned to AI to help create their nearly 300-page filing.
“The legal complaint was largely written by ChatGPT and Gemini,” Nan Zhong said. “We are going to file lawsuits against more universities very soon.”
A University of California spokesperson told McClatchy News that it hadn’t been served with the lawsuit as of February 20. “
If served, we will vigorously defend our admission practice,” the spokesperson said. “We believe this to be a meritless suit.”
The spokesperson noted California banned considering race in admissions in 1996 and said the University of California has followed that law accordingly.
“We stand by our admission policies and our record of expanding access for all qualified students,” the spokesperson said.
The university does ask applicants about their race and ethnicity in its undergraduate admissions application process, the spokesperson acknowledged.
However, they said this is only done to collect statistical data.
‘The Asian community is fed up’
After Stanley Zhong’s story initially made headlines, Nan Zhong heard from several Asian American parents and students who contacted him, sharing their experiences of college rejections, he said in a statement shared to SWORD’s website.
“The Asian community is fed up with repeated, outrageous college admission stories like this.”
In June 2023, race-based admissions were declared unconstitutional by the U.S. Supreme Court in the case of Students for Fair Admissions v. President and Fellows of Harvard College.
In a 6-3 majority opinion, the court ruled Harvard’s admission program violated the 14th Amendment.
Afterward, Stanley Zhong’s case was mentioned during a congressional hearing on the affirmative action ruling in September 2023.
He graduated from Henry M. Gunn High School as an accomplished student, with a 3.97 GPA, according to the lawsuit and his father.
He founded RabbitSign, a free online document signing service he designed and officially launched in 2021 before he graduated.
“Stanley’s rejection from these UC campuses was not based on his qualifications but on his race, as an Asian-American,” the lawsuit says.
“While it is true that Google’s job offer came after UC’s rejections — meaning UC could not have foreseen that Google would recognize Stanley’s skills had already reached the Ph.D. level — the fundamental issue remains: the technical achievements included in Stanley’s UC applications were substantially the same as those sent to Google,” reads the AI-assisted complaint.
In September, the Urban Institute reported the impact of the Supreme Court’s ruling on college admissions was unclear, based on publicly available data.
“Some schools have seen significant declines in the enrollment of students from certain racial or ethnic groups, whereas others have seen no change in the racial make-up of their entering class,” the Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit founded by President Lyndon B. Johnson said in its report.
The organization said “clear answers will require more information.”
The U.S. Department of Education is also named in Stanley and Nan Zhong’s lawsuit, which asks the court for relief and an unspecified amount in damages, in addition to demanding a jury trial.
The Department of Education didn’t return McClatchy News’ request for comment Feb. 20.
Stanley and Nan Zhong accuse the department of failing to take action against the University of California’s alleged racial discrimination against applicants.
By JULIA MARNIN/McClatchy News
