UCLA is not the only school to make changes in recent weeks to
its admission process that are aimed at promoting more fairness in
evaluating applicants.
While UCLA has altered the way it reads applications, other
schools are attempting to increase diversity by other means.
Harvard University, Princeton University and the University of
Virginia announced their decision to stop their early action and
early decision programs in early September, saying their goal is to
make the admission process more equitable for applicants of
disadvantaged backgrounds.
Princeton and University of Virginia, as well as the University
of Delaware ““ which decided to end its early admissions
program in June ““ all had binding early decision programs,
meaning applicants accepted early were required to attend. Students
who are accepted early also do not have the opportunity to compare
financial-aid packages from other schools. As a result, less
wealthy students tend to be not as willing to apply early
decision.
Subsequently, students who do apply early tend to be
“advantaged” students with less financial-aid concerns,
according to statements from these three institutions.
Often, students from low-income families are not as prepared to
apply early than more advantaged students, said Cass Cliatt, a
Princeton University spokeswoman.
“Students from more disadvantaged backgrounds often come
from schools without the college-preparation resources to position
them to apply early,” Cliatt said.
By abolishing these policies, these schools hope to send a
message that lower-income applicants will receive fairer
consideration and that the schools are committed to equality in the
admission process, according to the press releases from the
schools.
The University of California has never adopted any early
admission policy because faculty felt that it could hurt
disadvantaged students who would not be able to compare financial
packages, said Ricardo Vazquez, a UC spokesman.
In an effort to increase the number of underrepresented
minorities admitted, UCLA is changing its interpretation of the
UC-wide policy of comprehensive review in order to give more weight
to life experiences and hardships. While all UC campuses must
comply with the policy, each school can implement it
differently.
The change in UCLA’s admission policy comes after years of
falling numbers of minority admits. UC Berkeley, which uses
“holistic” review, has admitted a higher percentage of
minorities in recent years.
According to Vazquez, holistic review brings the different
aspects of an application together in one context, while, in
UCLA’s previous admissions process, each section of an
application was read separately.
Critics have said UCLA’s approach left application readers
with an incomplete picture of the applicant, making it difficult
for disadvantaged applicants to compete.
Still, the total number of schools that have made changes to
their admission policies is small.
The University of Pennsylvania, for example, has no plans to
alter its binding early decision policy.
“The early admissions process, which we have had for some
40 years, has been very successful for us and for our
students,” UPenn Dean of Admissions Lee Stetson said in a
statement.
Harvard, on the other hand, believes its early admission policy
has not been beneficial to its applicants. Harvard is eliminating
its non-binding early action program because the university
believes advantaged students tend to benefit more from the policy,
according to a press release from the school.
“Students from less advantaged backgrounds either fail to
take advantage of early admission because they are less
well-advised overall, or they consciously avoid our program on the
mistaken assumption that they will be unable to compare
financial-aid packages,” said William R. Fitzsimmons, dean of
admissions at Harvard College in a press release.
Amherst College in Massachusetts, which uses binding early
decision, is planning to discuss making changes to the admission
process to promote socioeconomic diversity, though it has no plans
to change its admission policy in the near future, said Stacey
Schmeidel, director of public affairs at Amherst College.
Amherst has put increasing socioeconomic diversity at the top of
its admission agenda, she said.
Not every school agrees that early admission policies
necessarily favor the advantaged; however, they do believe the
policies can be modified to be more fair.
John Etchemendy, provost of Stanford University, said in an
opinion article for the New York Times that early admission
policies do not favor the well-off if the admission standards for
the early pools are the same or higher than those of the later
applicant pool.
Like Harvard, Stanford uses a single-choice early action, which
does not force admitted students to attend.
If schools use the same standards in admitting students of both
applicant pools, “the programs do not give any advantage to
those who apply in the early round, and students who are uncertain
about where they want to go shouldn’t feel that they must
apply early,” Etchemendy said.
However, he noted that binding early decision does prevent
students from comparing financial-aid packages and said, that
rather than abolishing it altogether, schools should instead adopt
a non-binding early action policy.