The Bruin nation shouldn’t get its hopes up. It
doesn’t look good for UCLA on Saturday.
The USC Trojan’s football squad is favored to win this
year’s city championship by more than 20 points as they look
to continue steamrolling toward a national championship showdown
against Oklahoma. Barring quite an upset, USC will beat UCLA for
the fifth straight year.
At least UCLA is the better school.
But for how long will Bruins be able to say that?
The day when UCLA can no longer take pride in its superior
academic status may be coming soon. The “University of
Spoiled Children” is quickly developing a stronger academic
reputation. It’s no longer an institution where Daddy’s
fat bank account alone can buy a letter of admission, a degree and
a job after college.
Already the average SAT score for freshman entering USC is
higher than the average score for incoming freshmen at UCLA or UC
Berkeley. USC, with a smaller student body than UCLA, claimed 150
national merit scholars, compared to UCLA’s 94 last year.
Since 1998, USC has jumped from 41 to 30 in the U.S. News and World
Report’s rankings of the country’s best colleges. UCLA
has remained around 25 in that time.
USC is also improving in the area of diversity. An institution
with a reputation of being elitist has a student population whose
demographic make-up more closely reflects California’s
diversity than does UCLA’s student body. Administrators at
USC aggressively pursue top black and Latino students, while UCLA
admissions officers read applications where, in compliance with
state law, the race box is blacked out.
In recent years, USC has made greater improvements as an
institution than UCLA (though granted, they had more room to grow).
But UCLA students, faculty and administrators are not to blame.
State officials’ misplaced budget and political priorities
are making private universities look more attractive, as the appeal
of the most prestigious public university system in the world is
threatened. UC Berkeley and UCLA are falling behind in their
abilities to pay faculty competitive salaries. Worse, the single
greatest advantage UC schools have in luring top students away from
schools like USC ““ low student fees ““ may be severely
diminished if state and university officials continue their trend
of passing budget problems on to UC students and their
families.
UCLA fans should count their blessings Saturday, even if the
Bruins get waxed. UCLA is a top university. And in moments of
football pain, Bruins can wallow in immaturity and take solace in
the fact that the best of the Los Angeles schools resides in
Westwood ““ at least for now.