John Florez is taking time off. This column originally was published Sept. 12, 2005.

Utah's latest study group on the minority "achievement gap" reminds me of an article I came across while in graduate school — "Is it Scientific to be Optimistic?" It was a controlled and experimental study done at Walter Reed Hospital with World War II soldiers to determine who would be good soldier risks and who would be poor soldier risks.

When researchers did a follow-up, they found they were overwhelmingly incorrect in who they predicted would be poor soldier risks. They concluded that the soldiers succeeded because they were put in the ranks with tough leaders who expected them to succeed. No one told them they were poor soldier risks.

With minority students we have done the opposite. We have come up with creative labels to tell them they can't cut it. They are told they are a population at risk, a target group, underserved, in need of special help, and, my all-time favorite, a protected group. It makes minority students seem like an endangered species. Worst of all, we have created the victim syndrome where minorities are led to believe they cannot make it on their own and created a host of those who feel the need to save them.

And just when I thought I'd heard it all, experts have come up with a new malady, "the achievement gap." Some creative professionals have rediscovered that minorities are falling behind white students and need to determine what should be done to fix it. For at least four decades, we have studied minorities and found we needed more studies and funded programs to do the same. Somehow the professionals never do "take-aways," only reaffirm that more studies and more money is needed to perpetuate failing programs. They say it will require more special and targeted programs, bilingual, English as a second language (which I would argue is a second language for some non-minority students as well), tutoring and special testing for minorities. In addition, there are task forces, focus groups and committees trying to see how much more money we need to ask for to do the same, only more of it. In our effort to save minorities, we have created a lucrative "minorities industry" with targeted programs and an army of mercenaries.