Starting this year, the University of California will ask some
applicants to verify personal information on their
applications.
Randomly selected students will need to show evidence of
volunteer work, extracurricular activities or other personal
information.
The policies were implemented to reassure applicants that
students are not lying in an increasingly competitive admissions
process.
“We’re doing this in response to public perceptions
of the admissions process,” said Vu Tran, UCLA’s
director of admissions.
But university officials said they are not too concerned about
students lying on their applications because it is a very rare
occurrence.
In two pilot programs last year ““ one at UC San Diego and
one run through the UC Office of the President ““ no one was
caught lying on their application, said UC Press Aide Hanan
Eisenman.
“There’s no evidence to suggest misreporting is a
problem,” Eisenman said. “Most UC students are very
honest.”
The students selected this year ““ under a tenth of the
nearly 77,000 students who applied systemwide ““ received a
letter from the university in January.
They were asked to show proof of one personal item on their
application, such as a certificate of receiving an academic award
or a letter from a high school adviser.
Applicants who do not or cannot provide the additional
information will be denied admission to all UC campuses.
Because applicants usually apply to multiple campuses, the
program is being run through the main UC office instead of through
each campus, Tran said.
UCLA will investigate additional applications, but only if there
are discrepancies that are not resolved by the systemwide
office.
Faculty members and administrators recommended the verification
policy since the university started to use comprehensive review a
year ago, Eisenman said.
An applicant’s academic and personal qualifications are
considered along with their life challenges in UC admissions
decisions, although academics are the primary deciding factor.
Before comprehensive review, the majority of the
university’s admissions decisions were based on academic
factors alone.
But with personal factors now considered for all admissions
decisions, the university decided to verify information.
“This is done more to address the public concerns over
comprehensive review,” Tran said.
For years the university has required students to verify
self-reported academic information by providing transcripts and
test scores.
The university does not verify some “sensitive”
personal information, Eisenman said.
There is also other information the university cannot verify at
this time.
Tran said they are working on a way to verify a student’s
family income, which is often a component of the life challenges
portion of comprehensive review.