For over three hours today the UC Board of Regents will be closed away from the public in a San Francisco conference room discussing a plan that could drastically change the minimum freshman eligibility requirements and increase university access for a wider range of students.
If passed, the plan would increase statewide guaranteed-admissions rates based on high-school class ranking from the top 4 percent to the top 9 percent of students and decrease the guaranteed-admissions rates from the top 12.5 percent of all California high-school graduates to the top 9 percent, giving greater weight to relative achievement, where students are ranked against their immediate peers.
In addition to changing guaranteed-admissions standards, the plan would create an ‘entitled to review’ applicant pool, allowing those who are not guaranteed admission to apply and receive a comprehensive review of their application. Although these students wouldn’t necessarily meet basic UC eligibility requirements, applicants with special circumstances would not be completely shut out.
More than anything, these proposals will redistribute student access to the University of California so students from a wider range of socioeconomic backgrounds will be encouraged to apply. By adjusting the guaranteed-admissions rates to benefit high achievers in each high school, more students raised in low-income areas will be guaranteed admission to the university, making the state’s most prestigious institution of higher education more available to hard-working lower-income students.
Although this proposal may seem to unfairly benefit less-qualified students, it’s important to recognize how eligibility requirements are met in the first place. Many applicants from low-income areas lack access to the basic resources ‘mdash; like Advanced Placement courses or college guidance counselors ‘mdash; that help students prepare for the UC application process. According to an accountability report released by UC President Mark G. Yudof in September 2008, the number of underrepresented minorities who have graduated from a California public high school has increased by about 16 percent since 1989, while the percentage of these same students at the university has increased by a ghostly 0.7 percent. Statistically, many of these underrepresented students come from California’s poorest school districts, which are unable to offer the college-prepatory resources students have until now needed to be UC competitive.
This disparity demonstrates the ceiling placed above high-achieving low-income students who are excelling within their schools but still don’t measure up to students from better-equipped institutions. Realistically, if not all California students are given the same opportunities, it’s more just to judge students’ achievement against peers that are in the same situation. By recognizing that our state public schools’ limited resources simultaneously limit the achievements of the students who attend them, the Un
iversity of California is taking a progressive step toward improving state educational standards.
Even with these changes, high-achieving affluent students would still enjoy the same guaranteed-admission competition they experienced with the old standards. The difference now is that high-school graduates who finish at the top of their class in low-income areas will not be punished for the environment they grew up in and will be able to further their education at a higher institution.
Students shouldn’t be held accountable for systematic weaknesses they can’t control, and if the University of California’s mission aims to offer an affordable public education to all eligible applicants, how we define that eligibility is key to breaking down class barriers in our state. A college education is the most essential step to doing this, and giving motivated, intelligent students who are barred from the university because of their socioeconomic standing a chance to move forward would greatly ameliorate our state’s issues of class mobility.
This won’t cheapen our applicant pool; rather, it will open the university to even more hardworking young people. These newly considered applicants will still have to compete against the highly qualified students who were previously eligible. And this policy change would help make a college degree a realistic goal for all students, which should be this public university’s first responsibility. By instilling this goal early in all of the state’s high-school students, rather than alienating those without the opportunity to compete with California’s academically privileged, we can change the way students think about higher education and the way they plan for the future.
This proposal would strengthen the University of California, by demanding that we admit the state’s brightest young scholars, not just its most affluent ones.