The football phenom who couldn’t make the grade, the
master violinist with the low SAT score and the ballet whiz who
couldn’t make time for a second year of Spanish.
These are the square pegs whom the University of California has
taken strides toward accommodating with the admission by exception
program, a 1996 measure allowing exceptionally qualified applicants
to bend the university’s rigid eligibility requirements.
Under current policy, up to 6 percent of accepted applicants can
be admitted through admission by exception.
At UCLA, only 2 percent of admitted students are accepted
through this program, a bulk of whom are student-athletes, said
newly elected Undergraduate Students Association Council President
Jenny Wood.
The program is designed to prevent students with great potential
from slipping through the cracks.
“If you’re going to be the star of the UCLA football
team and you’re not eligible for the UC, they might recognize
your unusual football skills,” said UC Academic Senate Chair
George Blumenthal.
Though most students admitted through the program are athletes,
the admission by exception program also caters to disadvantaged
students, artistically and musically inclined students, and
home-schooled students unable to meet some of the UC’s strict
admission requirements.
“(The admission by exception program) recognizes that our
strict eligibility requirements are not the whole ball of wax.
There are students who fit into other categories who are not only
qualified, but would bring skills to the UC that would round out
the student experience,” Blumenthal said.
Wood plans on continuing her efforts to expand the admissions by
exception program.
“We’re pushing for more campuses to utilize
admission by exception to its full extent. The idea here is to
bring students that are capable of completing all the UC
coursework, that have shown leadership in various arenas of the
community,” Wood said. “Right now, the admissions pool
is very narrow.”
Chancellor Albert Carnesale said the pros and cons of expanding
the admission by exception program must be thoughtfully weighed
before action is taken.
“In order to make room for some other group of students,
there are going to be 100 UC-eligible students that would have been
admitted to UCLA and we’re not going to admit them,”
Carnesale said.
“You’ve got to look at this in great detail before
you decide if it’s a good idea,” he added.
Non-eligible students who apply would have to make the case that
both society and the university would be better off if they are
offered admission over a UC-eligible student, Carnesale said,
adding that this is “not an easy sell.”
Wood hopes to collaborate with other campus outreach groups to
start a summer program that would ease admission by exception
candidates into the social and academic pressures of a large
college campus like UCLA.
The program, which Wood said would be similar to UC
Berkeley’s Summer Bridge program, would admit about 100 to
150 applicants. Based on their performance through the course of
the summer, students may be invited to return in the fall.
Wood said she hopes the implementation of such a program will be
a major item in USAC’s agenda for the coming year.
A similar expansion of the admission by exception policy is
being considered at UC San Diego. If the proposed changes are
accepted, high school principals would be allowed to nominate
students for consideration in the program.
Most UC applicants are vetted on the basis of a strict 13-point
evaluation, a method some believe is based too heavily on SAT
scores and grade point average.
“The SATs are a little bit lacking in their ability to
indicate success at a UC,” Wood said. “SAT scores only
correlate with socio-economic status.”
The program helps to encourage a diversity of skills and
backgrounds within UC student bodies, Blumenthal said.
Of the 6 percent of acceptances allotted to the admission by
exception program, 4 percent can be used toward applicants deemed
disadvantaged.
Disadvantaged students are either from “low socio-economic
backgrounds” or have “experienced limited educational
opportunities,” according the UC Office of the President Web
site.