Embracing a controversial view of academic merit that has led to debate nationwide, the Board of Regents of the University of California agreed in March to accept the top 4 per cent of graduates from each high school in the state -- the most significant expansion of entrance criteria at the prestigious university system in two decades.
When it takes effect in 2001, the new gateway will yield about 3,600 more students, in addition to the roughly 28,400 now eligible. Projections are that most of those in the new pool will have earned A averages, but without the honors courses and the sky-high grades and SAT scores on the transcripts of today’s successful U.C. applicants in the top 4 per cent. The addition of 3,600 students will, however, add geographic and racial diversity at a time when California’s ban on most forms of affirmative action has cut into minority-student enrollments at the university, leading some parents and students to see U.C. as out of reach. The regents said they intended the new policy to change that view, by sending a message that the university’s eight undergraduate campuses value hard work and motivation shown by applicants from the lowest-performing schools as well as by those from the most privileged. “We’re increasing opportunity, and we’re rewarding excellence,” Gov. Gray Davis, a Democrat and president of the board, told other regents at the meeting. “What we’re going to get now are high achievers with guts and heart, people who have flourished maybe not in the best of surroundings.” While several regents worried that some highly ranked students from weak high schools would diminish the quality of the university, all but one board member supported the policy. The consensus among many regents and the state’s Democratic leaders was that admissions and access had to be broadened in the wake of the ban on racial preferences. Even so, a separate plan to change traditional entrance criteria suffered a partial defeat. A revised admissions “index,” still scheduled to be put in use in 2001, would de-emphasize the weight given to SAT 1 tests in favor of grades and SAT 2 achievement tests. To make the weight assigned to grades fair for all schools, faculty leaders wanted regents to reduce the bonus points given for completing honors and Advanced Placement courses, because they are offered more in some schools than in others. Under the revised index, about 315 borderline applicants would lose admissions spots that they would now get, while about 580 currently unsuccessful applicants would be accepted. But the board refused to reduce the bonus for honors courses, out of concern that some students wouldn’t take the classes. They asked the faculty for more study on that issue. Anxiety over the admissions changes extended to the 4-per-cent plan itself, which passed with many fingers crossed. High-school class rank is known as an unreliable indicator of college performance. According to some admissions experts, high-school seniors in the top 10 per cent of their class can have widely different SAT scores and levels of preparation from school to school, with minority or poor students often faring the worst. Texas, another state where racial preferences are banned at public colleges, decided in 1997 to extend admissions to the top 10 per cent from each high school. Racial diversity at the colleges has increased somewhat, but the effects on the academic competitiveness of freshman classes are unclear. “There’s some evidence that grading standards are more lenient in high-poverty schools, so to rely on class rank rather than tests could change admissions quite appreciably,” said Dan Koretz, a professor of education at Boston College and a senior fellow at the National Board for Educational Testing and Public Policy there. Based on current data, University of California officials expect this much: About 25 per cent of the newly eligible 3,600 students will be black and Hispanic, compared with 12 per cent in the current pool. Alma-mater diversity is the bigger winner: Almost 60 per cent of the 3,600 students are expected to come from rural and urban high schools, many of which now send only small numbers of graduates on to the university. In the university system’s admissions process, applicants are first deemed eligible to attend one of the eight undergraduate campuses, each of which then admits students from the accepted pool on the basis of grades, test scores, and other factors. Many of the newly eligible 3,600 probably won’t have the best grades and test scores needed to be admitted to the system’s two most competitive campuses, Berkeley and Los Angeles, where the numbers of minority freshmen have declined recently. “There’s no panacea here. This is just an attempt to move the ball forward,” said Antonio R. Villaraigosa, a regent by virtue of his being the Speaker of the Assembly. He and other lawmakers are expected to help create new need-based grants or other aid for those in the top-4-per-cent pool. With the new policy, the university is trying to chart its own course at an uncertain time. California expects a surge of about 500,000 more students seeking college admission in the next decade. University leaders are courting the state’s new Governor and legislative leaders, in part to protect campus appropriations if and when an economic downturn occurs. And many education experts in the state have called for a new master plan for higher education, to replace a 1960s plan that limits the University of California to accepting the top 12.5 per cent of high-school graduates statewide, as opposed to school by school. The new policy is not expected to take spots from other top applicants; rather, it is intended as an alternate to the 1977 formula of grades and test scores now used for admissions. University officials want to increase the pool of accepted students to the current Master Plan’s 12.5-per-cent target; the system now draws only 11.1 per cent. The idea of broadening access to ambitious high-school seniors who aren’t eyeing the university -- because their parents never went to college, or their high school sends few students to U.C., or for other reasons -- made the policy more appealing, especially for those who were suspicious of its intent. At the meetings last month during which regents approved the changes, the most rousing defense of the new policy was also the least expected. It came from Ward Connerly, the regent who had led the successful campaign to ban racial preferences in the state. Only days before, Mr. Connerly was on the fence about the proposal. But at a key committee meeting, he gripped the attention of Governor Davis and others as he said he would “gladly support” the policy. When the regents had banned preferences, he said, “we committed ourselves to think boldly, to step outside the box and try things that we may not have tried before, to see if they would work to make things better.” “I would urge we not look upon these 4-per-centers as people that we’re helping,” Mr. Connerly said. “These are high achievers. I think we should go in excited that they’re going to succeed, that they have performed in a rigorous setting, tough circumstances, and not go in with the idea that we’re setting them up for failure.” By the time the regents voted, momentum had built for the class-rank idea. It came not from the usual champions of policy changes -- the regents or the students -- but from a coterie of university and faculty leaders, who wanted some admissions alternative to high-school grades and SAT scores. Over the past year, through detailed presentations and conference calls with individual regents, the proponents had turned most critics into at least lukewarm supporters. The core strategy was to hit home what the proposal would not do: It would not displace other qualified applicants. It would not subvert the racial-preferences ban. It would not hurt academic quality. When the policy came up for a vote, many regents were still expressing doubts. Chief among them was the complaint that the university would ask nothing of low-performing high schools in return for the 4-per-cent gateway. “You’re letting those schools off the hook,” said John G. Davies, chairman of the board. “This does not raise the bar.” In the end, though, he threw his support behind the plan, in order “to be fair to students trapped” in mediocre schools, he said. Only one regent, Meredith J. Khachigian, voted against the new policy. She contended that it would allow unprepared students into the university and would diminish academic competitiveness. A plus for the policy, even its weariest critics acknowledged, was that it sounded good. Many regents have wanted a merit-based admissions route that would help applicants who did not have high SAT scores or who did not earn top grades at the best high schools. “I think it makes people feel good because it’s a stimulus for interest in the university,” Ms. Khachigian said in an interview. “But I think that everyone has strong misgivings about it and how it will succeed.” With competitive public universities nationwide struggling to find ways to consider merit in admissions that do not favor socio-economically privileged applicants, several of the regents and national education experts said they expected California’s new policy to be much studied. Most top public universities want to provide access to the broadest mix of high-quality applicants by seeking both merit and diversity. Administrators ask: How do you get both? Most of these universities use racial preferences, but with that approach being rejected in the courts and at the ballot box, some, like the University of Massachusetts, are de-emphasizing race. Eugene E. Garcia, dean of Berkeley’s School of Education, said the class-rank policies in California and Texas were noteworthy because they “contextualize merit.” Mr. Garcia, who has urged universities like his to stop using SAT scores in admitting students, said institutions would miss some high-school stars if all applicants were measured by national tests or statewide grade-point averages. “Public universities have to come up with more-defensible and comprehensive ways to determine who comes and who doesn’t,” he said. “People are not going to put up with decontextualized indexes that disadvantage whole sets of populations.” But others predicted that Californians would react negatively to the new class-rank policy. State Sen. Steve Peace, a Democrat from San Diego, said the change would punish strong students who attend competitive schools but aren’t in the top 4 per cent of their class. The result, he said, will be that many well-prepared minority students will not make the new cut, and that wealthy parents will try to “game the system” by finding good schools where their children can really excel. In the long run, Mr. Peace expects public outrage. “How are you going to defend one kid with high grades and SAT scores not getting in, when another kid with lower grades and SAT scores gets in just because he goes to another school?” he asked. “It’s an unbelievable concession to failure in the school systems.”
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