By Maggie Shiels in Stanford, California

Each black senior beamed with joy as they strode up to the altar of the Stanford Memorial Church to be presented with colourful pieces of Kente cloth from their proud parents, to mark their coming graduation from one of America's premiere universities.

This is the ninth year of the black graduation ceremony in Stanford

The ritual symbolised the passing on of the torch from one generation to another and is integral to the black graduation ceremony, an increasingly popular event that is being criticised by some as part of a well-intentioned but counter-productive approach to diversity.

Ward Connerly, a member of the University of California board of regents, told the Washington Post: "These celebrations are part of a larger context of cultural centres, black orientations, black studies and black housing.

"The problem is that this whole entourage of efforts has formed to isolate students in cultural ghettos."

Jan Barker Alexander, director of the Black Community Services Centre at Stanford and the assistant dean of students, told BBC News Online that such claims were nonsense.

People need to realise there is a difference between segregation and congregation Jan Barker Alexander

"I think people need to realise there is a difference between segregation and congregation and this is not an event that promotes segregation.

"And I personally do not apologise that I like to celebrate that which is positive about us because if we left it up to say the mainstream we would never see what is positive about us."

While university officials say these events are a way for minority students to celebrate cultural connections, they are increasingly coming under the spotlight as the education establishment braces itself for a ruling from the Supreme Court on affirmative action policies.

In the dock is the University of Michigan. Next week the justices will rule on two lawsuits filed by the Washington DC-based Centre for Individual Rights on behalf of two white students, who allege they were turned down while black students with lower scores and grades were accepted.

A student's ethnicity is one of many factors taken into account under the university's points system alongside grades, test scores, parents who are alumni, geography and high school.

But the undergraduate admissions office awards 20 points for race - which accounts for a fifth of the total needed to gain entrance.

President Bush has backed the suits, saying he supports racial diversity in higher education, but that Michigan's practices amount to "a quota system that unfairly rewards or penalises prospective students based solely on their race".

'Overcoming doubt'

In his invocation to black seniors during the celebration at Stanford, Amani Rushing made reference to the lawsuit.

"We have to face the doubt of outsiders," he said.

"People who say or think that affirmative action got us in here, that we won't be able to compete or succeed once we get here.

"We have all overcome adversity and we have black graduation for us to express how proud we are so don't be afraid to let someone know how proud you are today."

Victor Moulin and his mother: proud to be there

For 21-year-old Myisha Patterson, graduating with a Bachelor of Arts in human biology, the ceremony was about more than being a black woman in a white world.

"I think that when people think black they take it as just skin value. And we are not celebrating just a skin colour.

"We are celebrating a tradition of triumph. A tradition of making it when no one thought we could."

Among the sea of black faces was the white one of Victor Moulin, a biological sciences graduate.

He said he didn't mind being in the minority and that far from being excluded, he felt very included.

"Some people in the community may be apprehensive of having a white person around because they may have experienced racism at some point in their life or have some mistrust for white people.

"But that hasn't affected me because there are so many people who have welcomed me with open arms.

"This is about being together with your family and all the close friendships you have formed over the last four years."

The ceremony is very much a family occasion

Another graduate, 22-year-old Damon Merrill Jones, said that for him, being one of 143 students who were able to take part in the Stanford black graduation celebration was an important milestone.

"Something of this magnitude could not have happened 30 years ago because there weren't as many of us here on campus.

"So this is a celebration of that too, the legacy and the numbers that keep increasing. Next year will be our biggest class of black students."

In 1960, there were just two black students in the freshman/first year class that entered Stanford.

Today the university says 10-12% of blacks make up the 7,000-strong undergraduate body.

Damon's mother, Doris, says what her son has achieved in gaining a first class education sets the standard for others to follow.

"The reason there is a black celebration is because a lot of recognition is not given to blacks," she said.

"You have to realise there are a lot of parents and grandparents here who were in that generation who were not allowed to go to school or to learn how to write. So there is a pride here tonight."