SAN FRANCISCO “”mdash; The UC Board of Regents met to discuss possible freshman eligibility requirement changes and what UC President Mark G. Yudof described as a “robust change” to financial aid availability for low-income students. These changes would be a two-part advancement to make the University of California system both accessible and affordable to all of California’s students.
The proposed changes to eligibility requirements will go into effect with the freshman class of 2012 and will be voted on by the entire Board of Regents today. The changes in required testing, while intensely debated, are not extremely different from the current policy, which dictates that each applicant submit at least two Subject Tests.
The current system requires that students complete their required A-G coursework by the time they graduate from high school, and the 3.0 (weighted) GPA will remain unchanged.
Still, the inclusion of advanced placement coursework into the GPA calculation does provide a disadvantage to students who attend high schools that offer little to no AP courses, said student Regent D’Artagnan Scorza. Without the GPA boost AP courses offer, students must work harder to achieve the 3.0 requirement, he said, and by doing so, their application would be eligible for review.
“However, getting rid of the SAT Subject Test requirement is a step in the right direction,” Scorza added.
The number of AP courses a student takes would be considered in relation to how many AP courses are offered at their high school, said Ricardo Vázquez, a spokesman for the UC Office of the President. A student who takes three out of three available courses would essentially have a higher standing than a student who takes three out of six available courses, for example, he said. In this way, the application process would encourage academic rigor without disenfranchising students based on what high school they went to, Vázquez added.
The final change to the eligibility requirements, if passed, would no longer require students to take the SAT Subject Tests. Over the last four years, the Academic Senate has researched the effectiveness of the scores students receive on their Subject Test as a predictor of their success at the UC and found that it was an ineffective indicator.
To illustrate this point, Lucero Chavez, the president of the UC Student Association and a student at the Boalt School of Law at UC Berkeley, told the board about her experience with the SAT Subject Tests.
“I took the Spanish Subject Test and received 770 out of 800. I could have told you I was bilingual in my application and saved the state the money they spent on my fee waiver and saved my mom the day she had to take off work in order to get me to the exam.”
The proposed changes would also mean that the applicant pool would grow significantly, making each campus more selective.
Moreover, the number of students who are offered guaranteed admission to the UC system will decrease. Under the proposed plan, only the top 9 percent of high school students in their graduating class would be offered guaranteed acceptance through what the UC calls the “referral program.” Still, the students who receive guaranteed admission do not necessarily get admittance to the campus of their choosing, according to the proposal.
The board said that it hopes the changes in eligibility will create a more diverse applicant pool, allowing more students from underrepresented groups to gain access to the UC system.
“We will obtain exceptional students through this process, and that is the ultimate goal,” Regent Russell S. Gould said.
The Blue and Gold Opportunity Plan will give enough grant and scholarship money to pay for all educational and registration fees for the entire year for students whose annual family income is $60,000 or less.
By using the median income rate for the state, roughly half of all families in California would now be financially able to attend a UC, according to proposal documents.
“This will send a clear message that if you work hard and get in to a UC, don’t worry about it. We’ll figure it out,” Yudof said.
The Blue and Gold Opportunity Plan will receive its funding from an increase in the percentage of student fees as well as Cal Grants. However, because the new program relies on Cal Grants for 68 percent of its funding, it will be re-evaluated every year to determine the financial ability of the university to continue offering the package, according to the official initiative documents.