By Shauna Mecartea and Kelly
Rayburn
Daily Bruin Reporters
After 11th-hour revising, the UC Board of Regents unanimously
voted to repeal of SP-1 and SP-2 at today’s meeting at UC San
Francisco.
Student Regent Justin Fong, who planned to propose an alternate
item to the action, RE-28, at the meeting, ended up supporting the
measure alongside original SP-1 and SP-2 proponent Regent Ward
Connerly after the revisions were made.
“I want to make this very, very clear to the students who
have fought against SP-1 ““ this is a huge victory,” he
said, just before the vote.
The board passed SP-1 and 2 in 1995 in a 14-10 and 15-10 vote,
respectively, ending the use of affirmative action in admissions,
hiring and contracting throughout the UC.
A year later, California voters approved the Connerly-backed
Proposition 209, amending the state constitution to end affirmative
action. Thus, the repeal of SP-1 and 2 is a largely symbolic action
since Proposition 209 is still in effect.
The final text of RE-28 was changed to read “Resolution
Rescinding SP-1 and SP-2,” whereas the original text said
RE-28 “Superseded SP-1 and SP-2.”
A clause stating that some students at the university
“have expressed pride in knowing that they were admitted on
the basis of their own accomplishment” since the
implementation of SP-1, was removed. Many students had criticized
the clause as applauding SP-1 and 2.
There is also language ending the “two-tiered”
admissions criteria mandated in SP-1 by which 50-75 percent of all
students must be admitted by academic criteria only.
Awaiting the death of SP-1 and 2, more than 100 protesters
flocked to UCSF to denounce RE-28, the item that would replace
them.
The protesters were initially unaware of the changes in diction
made to RE-28, until Fong emerged from the meeting to notify the
crowd of the revisions.
The protesters cheered when news arrived that RE-28 passed in
its revised form.
Many of protesters traveled from UCLA in vans that left the
night before, with little to no sleep.
One of the students who made the trip was Ingrid Gonzales, a
UCLA alumna now working in the Student Retention Center.
As a Pilipina immigrant, she experienced the struggles many
underrepresented students face to get into a UC school. She said
simple cultural differences gave her classmates reason to tease her
about the way she dressed or the accent she had.
“I was the Asian student in the class, or in the whole
school,” she said.
Regent William Bagley, a long-time supporter of the repeal of
SP-1 and 2, said the decision would help eliminate the use of UC as
a political vehicle and mend its reputation.
“We are no longer the sponsors of a national
movement,” he said. “And to future regents: please
reject all who would use the University for or against political or
ideological advancements.”
Regent Ward Connerly also voiced support for RE-28, but for
different reasons. Connerly said he would cast an affirmative vote
so the regents could move on, leaving the use of race in admissions
and the negativity surrounding SP-1 in the past.
Despite Connerly’s vote, he reaffirmed that there is
nothing wrong with SP-1.
“We’re extending the olive branch,” he said,
on behalf of those regents sharing his views on SP-1. “Hell,
we’re extending the whole damn olive tree.”
Only Gov. Gray Davis, a regent by virtue of his office, did not
cast an affirmative vote on RE-28, since he was not present at the
meeting.
Davis voted against SP-1 in 1995 when he was lieutenant
governor. As governor, he has promised not to fight Proposition
209.