For 13 years, University of California officials have wrestled with a seemingly insoluble problem: how to sustain a student body that reflects the state's vast diversity without violating Proposition 209, the 1996 ballot measure banning race-based affirmative action.
The latest attempt to formulate a policy that is both legal and capable of increasing diversity is a controversial new admissions mandate that will take effect in fall 2012. A slow-brewed product of the UC Academic Senate's Board of Admissions and Relations with Schools (BOARS), the plan would give more high school students a shot at getting admitted to a UC school, but guarantee fewer of them spots.
Currently, the top 12.5% of high school seniors in the state are guaranteed admission to a UC school -- something originally set out in the 1960 California Master Plan for Higher Education. More recently, the top 4% of students at all schools in the state have been assured a spot. Under the new guidelines, only the top 9% statewide are guaranteed spots, as well as the top 9% at every high school. The theory is that this will guarantee more spots for students at underperforming high schools where opportunities are not as great and more of the students are underrepresented minorities.
The new rules also will create a larger pool of students entitled to be considered for -- but not guaranteed -- admission. To be considered, applicants must still take required college prep courses, have a 3.0 grade-point average and take the basic SAT exam. But they will no longer be required to also take SAT subject tests, something the plan's designers hope will benefit black and Latino students, who are less likely to take the exams.
But as is always the case when admissions policies change, there will be winners and losers. The plan's critics say it is unlikely to bring in more black and Latino students and that white applicants will be the biggest beneficiaries. More important, they allege, it will slash the UC eligibility of Asian American students, who benefit by the current larger guarantee of placement for top students statewide.
Sacramento's 10-member Asian Pacific Islander Legislative Caucus has proclaimed the plan to be outright discrimination against Asian Pacific Islanders. And many Asian Americans see the move as directly aimed at bringing down their numbers in California's universities.
