OCR Text |
Show HINCKLEY JOURNAL OF POLITICS SPRING 2001 Florida's twenty percent plan is too broad. California's 4 percent plan, because it is more closely tied to test scores, may constitute a more "narrowly tailored" plan. However, the smaller the percentage plan, the less impact it will have for better or for worse. "Narrowly tailored" percentage plans, more likely to pass constitutional muster, may help provide opportunities to some disadvantaged students, but unlike Florida's twenty percent plan, they will have a smaller impact on minority students. EXPANDED OUTREACH & RECRUITMENT PLANS In addition to percentage plans, Florida as well as other universities, have increased their efforts to recruit underrepre-sented minorities. Despite the concern that the demise of affirmative action in admissions would result in a lack of commitment to minority students, the opposite seems to be true. On the whole, "colleges from coast to coast are aggressively vying for qualified3 minority students" (Kleiner 2000). Though it is important to note the decline in minority student enrollment at UC Berkeley directly following passage of 209; the increased efforts of universities to aggressively expand outreach and recruiting of underrepresented minorities is a positive outcome of court rulings and citizen lawmak-ing. According to recent figures, "The percentage of minority students admitted to the University of California has nearly reached affirmative action levels" and "of the students the UC system admitted for the fall 2001 first-year class, 18.6 percent were black, Latino, Chicano, and American-Indian." The percentage is just slightly under 1997's 18.8 percent, which was the last time that UC system used racial preferences in admissions (Sturrock 2001). Dennis Galligani, associate vice president for the UC system student academic services, states that he is "especially pleased with the high increase in underrepresented students who were admitted," and adds that, "we'd like to believe the investment in our outreach efforts is paying off (Sturrock 2001). The increases in minority enrollment across the board are promising, though at the state's most prestigious school, UC Berkeley, the increase in underrepresented minorities has yet to reach the 1997 level. In the long run, focusing on outreach and recruitment efforts to attract qualified minorities and economically disadvantaged applicants is a much better process than creating a dual admissions system in which individuals are discriminated against, less qualified students are given admittance over more qualified students, or race is used as a determinative factor in deciding between equally qualified students. Furthermore, "many public institutions in the states with affirmative action bans have tinkered with their race-based scholarship programs to try to maintain diversity-opening them up to all students from economically disadvantaged schools" (Kleiner 2000). 3 "Qualified" here refers to scholastic achievement as measured by standardized tests and GPAs Similarly, in the aftermath of Proposition 209, the University of California at Berkeley greatly expanded its outreach programs. They are spending $150 million, more than twice the pre-209 number, in efforts "to increase the pool of qualified minority students" (Kleiner 2000). Again, though the initial drop in minority enrollments is unfortunate, the benefit of increased outreach and recruitment efforts for both minority and disadvantaged students is a more constitutional method for reaching both short term and long-term goals of increasing diversity and opportunity. Similarly, The University of Washington is focusing on college transfers as a way to increase diversity and compensate for Initiative 200's ban on preferential treatment. In certain academic disciplines women are a minority. Similar to programs that seek to increase racial diversity; some universities also focus on outreach programs that seek to increase the gender diversity in certain disciplines. One local example of an outreach program is the University of Utah's Access Program for Women. This program is designed to increase the number of women who choose to study science. Twenty-one female high school graduates who have committed to attending the University of Utah and have indicated their interest in studying the sciences are selected to live on campus during the summer semester immediately following their graduation from high school. The women are chosen based upon an application that considers their GPA, class rank, ACT/SAT scores, a one page letter expressing their interest in science and career goals, high school transcripts, two letters of recommendation from high school science or math teachers, advanced placement test scores, academic awards, science projects, extracurricular activities, high school honors, etc. The program is a fifteen-week, semester program and each week the students learn from professors from various science-related programs. The advantages of this program are numerous; students are able to meet advisors and professors in their specific field of study prior to their initial semester. One former ACCESS Program participant who is nearing completion of her degree in materials science and engineering stated, "It was helpful to know some teachers already and have an idea of what to expect in the classroom" (Miller 2001). Similarly, other benefits associated with these types of programs are directly tied to the opportunity of minorities within a specific major, and in this particular case women. The ACCESS Program gives women a chance to interact with other women prior to the regular classroom setting, and as this particular ACCESS Program participant commented, "It was really nice to be around other girls who had similar goals," and "it was nice to start out in an all girls' class in a male-dominated field." Similarly, she commented that it was "nice to know other women that would be in your Fall Semester classes" (Miller 2001). Other types of efforts that illustrate "affirmative action" in higher education include scholarships and programs that 17 |