Diversity doesn't only mean race. It can mean cultural backgrounds, experiences, values and viewpoints. It can mean creative vs. analytic thinkers, artistic vs. not, leadership, extroversion, unusual contributions to society, and so on. If you're a physics expert in a team of math experts, you add diversity.
Take University of Washington for example. They ask for a "diversity essay". They define diversity as "diverse in cultural backgrounds, experiences, values and viewpoints." [1]
[1] https://admit.washington.edu/apply/freshman/how-to-apply/wri...
I'd imagine it is about the same! Why? Because they don't really care about the essays.
Applications are not reviewed by "admissions people". They hire temporary workers (grad students, retirees etc) to review applications, and give them 8min per application. And that's for the whole application, and they have barely any time to read your essay. See story about UW, which I am referencing here [1].
The reason for making you write essays is just to obfuscate the reason you were denied admission.
[1] https://www.king5.com/article/news/local/a-look-inside-admis...
Yes it does. It's an imperialist code-word for state sanctioned racism against the majority population of the proletariat in order to pit the proletariat against itself. Absolutely no one is fooled.
Public universities, especially, must use objective criteria. Students need to be able to control their own destiny through hard work. That's a basic principle of fairness that should apply in this land of opportunity. No "shaping" of the student body by universities that receive funding from taxpayers, because that is unfair to students. Imagine being denied admission by the only good public university in your state, not because your grades or test scores are not good enough, but because you didn't fit in whatever "shape" the university decided is appropriate for that year!