The case along with others awaiting Supreme Court action has been rescheduled for a conference Friday. There is no time limit on when the court must decide whether to take the case, and the court did not mention the school's case in its list of Monday orders issued April 16, the first date a ruling could have come down.

A decision against taking the case would mean letting stand an earlier 8-7 ruling from the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in favor of the Kamehameha Schools and its 120-year-old admissions policy that effectively excludes non-Hawaiians.

If the high court takes the case, it could set the stage for one of the most significant court actions in years involving Native Hawaiians. A ruling could come as early as summer 2008.

The case involves an unnamed, non-Hawaiian teenager and his mother who filed a lawsuit contending the private, nonprofit school system's admissions policy violates federal civil rights law.

Kamehameha Schools, the largest private landowner in the state, was established in 1887 under the will of Princess Bernice Pauahi Bishop. It serves nearly 5,000 of the more than 70,000 Native Hawaiian schoolchildren at the flagship Kapalama Heights campus and in schools on Maui and the Big Island.