Education

University of California Eyes Admission Changes

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) ― University of California regents took a polite, but noncommittal look Wednesday at a faculty proposal that would dramatically change the UC system's admissions standards.

A committee of the Board of Regents opted to discuss rather than vote on the multifaceted plan, which would give high school students who have not completed the prescribed college-prep courses or earned minimum test scores a shot at attending a UC campus.

"It's too important to rush through, it's too important to delay," said Regent Eddie Island, who chairs the educational policy committee reviewing the recommendations. He advocated scheduling another meeting where the full board could study the eligibility issue in depth.

Under the faculty proposal, students who can demonstrate they are close to meeting the systemwide grade-point average and course completion thresholds could have their applications considered individually by UC's nine undergraduate campuses—beginning with the Fall 2012 term.

Unlike peers who meet the criteria outright, such students would not be guaranteed admission to a school somewhere within the system, a promise that has been a hallmark of UC's admissions policies since the early 1960s.

The change is designed to reach prospective freshmen who are academically able, but may have lacked access to the information or classes they needed early in their high school careers to put them on the UC path, according to UC Davis engineering professor Mark Rashid, who spearheaded the proposed revisions.

Regent George Marcus expressed reservations, however, about creating a dual set of standards and the possibility that it would build unfairness into the admissions process.

"Basically, we are going to take a seat from a student who followed the rules," Marcus said. "It could be perceived that we are becoming a subjective admission university instead of an objective public institution."

Several regents commented favorably on another aspect of the faculty proposal—eliminating SAT subject tests as an entrance requirement. UC, which started mandating the subject tests as a condition of admission during the 1970s, is the only large public university system to require them, Rashid said.

Students still would have to take the general SAT test that covers math, writing and verbal reasoning or the comparable ACTs.

To make room for students whose applications automatically get rejected under the current GPA-courses-test scores formula, the revised policy would reduce the number of high school seniors for whom the UC system seeks to guarantee admission.

As drafted, the faculty proposal would change the GPA and test score standards so about one out of every 10 high school seniors qualifies for the admissions guarantee, down from a model that now targets one out of eight graduates.

Regent Joanne Kozberg observed that such a change would necessarily mean that students who would get in under the current rules could be left out.

"We are going to be squeezing someone out," Kozberg said.

Rashid conceded that students who barely win admission guaranteed admission now—a group he described as "pretty good students at very good schools"—would lose such certainty under the proposal, although they still would be able to have their applications reviewed.

Two years in the making, the proposal was approved on a 38-12 vote last month by the legislative arm of the university's Academic Senate, but support for it is not uniform across UC's campuses. Faculty groups at UC Berkeley, UC Santa Cruz and UC Riverside took separate votes to oppose it.

Richard Blum, chairman of the Board of Regents, said the full board could schedule a briefing on the proposed admissions criteria as early as September.

(© 2008 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)