Plans Seek More UC Pupils From Poorer Schools

The ban on affirmative action in admissions to the University of California has spawned a series of proposals seeking other ways of increasing the number of students drawn from the state’s poorer-performing high schools.

The plans, including a proposed state constitutional amendment, would guarantee admission to the top-ranking students from each of California’s 844 public high schools--the rich ones, the poor ones and those of every racial mix.

Some proposals would promise spots only to valedictorians while others would extend offers to the top 4%, or 6% or even 12.5% of each high school’s graduating class. Proponents say such measures would improve the geographic distribution of UC students, inspire competition within lackadaisical high schools and reward disadvantaged students who now lose out to their wealthier counterparts in the competition for UC admissions.

Skeptics see another motivation: an attempt to skirt California’s ban on racial preferences.

“If we stack the deck so we get so many students from South-Central Los Angeles and so many from Compton High, there is a question whether it is giving preferential treatment,” said UC Regent Ward Connerly, the state’s leading affirmative action foe. “That would run afoul of Prop. 209.”

But UC President Richard C. Atkinson said last week that he believes “it’s not a bad idea” to offer automatic admission to the top 4% of each high school’s graduates--a plan that could fill a third of UC’s freshman class. The remaining seats would be filled by open competition among all applicants.

“If you are saying that in a large high school the top four people in every hundred aren’t UC eligible, I think they are,” Atkinson said. “But if you are saying, you are just doing that for racial diversity, I would say there are lots of reasons to do it.”

Disparity in Admissions

There is statewide competition now for 24,500 freshman slots at the nine UC campuses.

Each year, 46,000 of the state’s 259,000 graduating public high school seniors apply for the openings--pitting students from Beverly Hills High against those from Compton High.

Many of the most talented students end up going to private colleges. Nevertheless, the state Department of Education notes a wide disparity in how high schools feed students to UC. The latest figures show Beverly Hills High, for instance, sending nearly 20% of its graduates there, while Compton sent only 1% of its graduates.

Some officials are concerned that such disparities will grow as UC eliminates affirmative action in undergraduate admissions next year. Race, ethnicity and gender were dropped as factors in graduate school admissions this year--even before voters in November approved Prop. 209, the ballot measure banning such preferences.

Since then, half a dozen plans have surfaced to reserve seats for students from all California public high schools. They range from Lt. Gov. Gray Davis’ proposal to set aside slots for merely the top two students at each school to a constitutional amendment proposed by Sen. Teresa Hughes (D-Inglewood), which would offer admission to the top 12.5%.

A UC analysis of such a 12.5% plan estimated that it would boost the percentage of Latino students by more than half and slightly increase the number of African Americans, while decreasing the percentage of Asian Americans and whites.

The analysis also indicated that the 12.5% plan would lower academic standards--measured by grade point averages and SAT scores--for all groups. That prompted some second-guessing about any proposal to automatically admit such a large proportion of each high school’s graduates.

“I don’t believe the university would want us to lower our standards to accommodate other goals,” said Dennis Galligani, UC’s assistant vice president who oversees admissions.

But the idea of reserving seats for each high school--including the most troubled--has many backers, including the revered former UC president, Clark Kerr. “Someone who has things in their favor all of their lives doesn’t deserve the same credit as someone who had to operate in difficult circumstances,” Kerr said.

Such proposals are sure to be controversial, however.

Last summer, when UC San Diego proposed giving extra points to applicants from disadvantaged high schools, parents complained that it would penalize high-quality schools--and harm property values. “We scrapped the idea,” said Richard Backer, an assistant vice chancellor. “It got blown out of proportion.”

Still, Lt. Gov. Davis defends as reasonable his plan to guarantee UC seats to the top two students at each high school, or perhaps four or five students. “We allow a 320-pound lineman to go to UCLA even if he doesn’t meet all of the requirements,” Davis said. “Let’s do it for the top two people graduating from high school.”

Senate leader Bill Lockyer (D-Hayward) did not go that far. On Jan. 19, while acting as governor--because Gov. Pete Wilson and Davis were out of state--he issued a proclamation calling on UC to provide “guaranteed enrollment” merely for high school valedictorians.

The proclamation has no force of law. Even a law passed by the Legislature could not dictate policy for the constitutionally autonomous University of California--unlike in Texas, where lawmakers are considering a measure to grant university admission to the top 10% at each high school.

So Hughes has introduced a measure to amend the California Constitution to specify that the top 12.5% from each high school be entitled to UC admission. Hughes said she also will soon ask the Senate and Assembly to set up a joint committee to explore ways to revise UC admission policies.

“The main reason to do this is to have the student population reflect the state’s diversified population and give the opportunity to all students,” she said. “This is a colorblind approach.”

But her plan would benefit some minority students, according to computer simulations run by UC after the Board of Regents abolished affirmative action in 1995. Picking the top 12.5% of each high school’s graduates based on grades and SAT scores, the study said, would increase “UC eligible” Latinos from 3.9% to 6.2% and African Americans from 5.1% to 5.5%. The percentage of Asian Americans would drop 6 percentage points, and white students about 2 points.

Saul Geiser, UC’s manager of research and planning for student academic services, said the increase in black and Latino students was not as much as some proponents had wished. “If the hope is to produce a significant difference in racial and ethnic diversity, this isn’t it,” he said.

One reason is that the strategy would give automatic entrance not only to top students in inner-city schools but in small rural ones, which are predominantly white. Another is that many of the predominantly black or Latino high schools have had a sprinkling of Asian Americans or others who make up a disproportionate number of top achievers.

Learning From Sports Drafts

Rodolfo Alvarez, a UCLA sociologist proposing that 6% from each school be guaranteed enrollment, contends that the real effect would result over time as the prospect of automatic college admission inspires better performance in schools and becomes a source of neighborhood pride.

“If you guarantee the top 6%, think what it does to the community,” he said. “The local Rotary and Lion’s clubs become enlivened and excited by knowing that some of their kids are going to the university.”

Joining with a UC Santa Barbara sociologist, Alvarez in February began circulating a 17-page paper detailing a revised admissions strategy that he likens to the draft for pro sports teams: Each of UC’s campuses would develop a list of feeder high schools from across the state, then make early admissions offers to their students.

If students did not get into the campus that they wanted, they could take their chances in the regular admissions cycle, competing with top talent across the state.

Hughes has been sufficiently intrigued by this approach that she wants to incorporate it--and the 6% figure--into her legislation. She recently held a strategy session with Alvarez and representatives from the NAACP and the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund.

UC administrators emphasize that they are committed to figuring out how to preserve a diverse student body without violating the regents’ ban on racial preferences. They thus are focused on outreach to low-performing public schools to boost the preparation of disadvantaged students.

But Atkinson expressed interest in tinkering with admissions policy as well. “My original idea was to let the principals make the decision of selecting who is eligible,” he said. “But there are a lot of problems with that. People didn’t respond too well to that.”

No Easy Alternatives

Before 1960, the university did reserve about 10% of its freshman class for special admissions--largely for students recommended by principals, said John A. Douglass of UC Berkeley’s Center for Studies in Higher Education.

In the ‘60s, that was scrapped in favor of a more systematic compilation of grades and SAT scores. UC also began its affirmative-action programs, first inspired by the civil rights movement then fortified in 1974 when the Legislature declared that student bodies should reflect the racial and ethnic makeup of the state.

Preparing for the hordes of baby boomers entering colleges, the Master Plan for Higher Education mandated that the top 12.5% of high school graduates would be eligible for UC admission and the top 33.3% for admission to the California State University system.

But those percentages referred to all graduates statewide, not of each high school.

In reality, some schools produce few graduates who survive the competition for UC slots.

In Los Angeles County, for instance, 39 of the 171 public high schools sent fewer than 4% of their 1995 graduates to UC, according to the state Department of Education.

Orange County had six high schools--Valley, Century, Western, Anaheim and Santa Ana and Aliso Niguel--that fell below the 4% mark that year. In Ventura County, Fillmore, Hueneme and Oxnard high schools sent fewer than 4% of its seniors to UC.

But other high schools--such as San Marino, South Pasadena and Sunny Hills in Fullerton--sent one-fourth of their seniors to UC. The lower ranking of these students could lose out if the process was changed to guarantee 4% admissions to every school.

Atkinson and others concede that any revision poses problems.

One of the thorniest is how the reserved seats would be distributed at various UC campuses. Standards for admission to UC Berkeley and UCLA are higher than for the other campuses, driven by demand. Should a reserved seat at UC Berkeley be awarded the same as to UC Riverside?

Another problem is that some high schools, often the small rural ones, don’t offer all the courses--for instance in the sciences--UC requires for admission.

“We would have to assure that those students . . . would spend the summer in special remedial courses that would permit them to come up to speed,” Atkinson said.

Despite such problems, the concept of setting aside seats for each school intrigues even those suspicious of its intent.

Connerly, the regent who orchestrated the affirmative action ban, said he is open to any strategy that might change the culture that discourages poor children from pursuing higher education.

“If we can turn this around and make it cool to compete academically,” he said, “it could have the impact of turning around the black community. . . . It’s worth trying. If there ever was a time for us to try different things, this is it.”

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Expanding Eligibility

University of California officials conducted a study to estimate the impact of a proposal to admit the top 12.5% of the graduates of each California high school. The conclusions: More black and Latino students would be eligible for UC and the eligible percentage of Asian American and white students would decline.

CURRENT ELIGIBILITY VS. PROTECTED ELIGIBILITY

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Current Projected potential freshmen potential freshman African American 5.1% 5.5% Latino 3.9% 6.2% Asian American 32.2% 26.0% White 12.7% 10.6%

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AVERAGE ACADEMIC INDEX SCORE

The plan would also diminish the academic profile of candidates for UC enrollment, with a drop in the academic index score for each racial and ethnic group. The score is based on a formula using grade-point averages and SAT scores.

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Current Projected potential freshmen potential freshman African American 6,515 5,797 Latino 6,537 5,911 Asian American 6,719 6,529 White 6,681 6,632 Total eligibility pool 6,677 6,443

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Source: University of California