Data from 1995 to the present recently released by UCLA shows that students who identify as black and Latino or Chicano are admitted with lower average high school GPAs and SAT scores than white and Asian students.
University officials firmly maintain UCLA does not violate state law in its admissions process and say any trend data does not provide a complete picture of admissions.
But Ward Connerly, a former UC Regent and author of legislation that banned affirmative action in California, insists UCLA is illegally attempting to admit more minorities, and, while doing so, sacrificing the academic standards of the university.
UCLA’s admissions process can be complicated and takes many factors about each applicant into account.
Director of Admissions Vu Tran said there is no clear formula for how each application is scored but emphasized that every conceivable factor except race and gender is considered.
University policy states that the largest factor in admissions must be academics, which include GPA and SAT scores, while other much smaller factors include the income of a student’s parents, whether a student is a first-generation college student, and the academic ranking of the high school.
Some of the numbers, which include racial breakdowns of several admissions factors, provide a relatively rare look into specific admissions trends and statistics.
The figures showed that on average students from lower-performing high schools and low-income families have had slightly higher acceptance rates since 2002.
Further, Asian students, on average, have had almost universally higher acceptance rates over the past several years, including Asian students from low income brackets or attend a low performing high school compared to other ethnicities in those categories.
Students who are in the top 3 percent of their class qualify for “eligibility in the local context”, which means they are guaranteed admission to at least one University of California campus, an have seen slightly increase acceptance rates to UCLA in the past three years.
Connerly argues that looking at trends in admissions data, such as average SAT scores and GPAs, is important because it can point to academic deficiencies in groups of admitted students.
But Ana-Christina Ramon, research coordinator for the UCLA Ralph J. Bunche Center for African American Studies, said the figures show UCLA considers a number of factors in admissions.
“Traditional indicators of merit which are often heavily relied upon are now still pretty high on average, but in general you can see that the more diverse student body that was accepted shows that other factors are also taken into consideration,” she said.
Connerly agreed that UCLA should not only look at test scores, but added he is particularly concerned about the gaps between the races.
“I’m not one to believe that you should rely solely on GPA and SAT (scores) but when you systemically discriminate against two groups of students in favor of the other two in order to compensate for the academic gap … that is morally wrong and constitutionally wrong,” Connerly said.
He added that accepting black and Latino and Chicano students with SATs and GPAs lower than white and Asian students is unfair to those held to a higher academic standard.
But Tran noted that looking at such a narrow batch of statistics constitutes a “snapshot in a very limited angle” and said admissions statistics are lacking the more intangible factors such as the personal statement.
“They are all qualified based on overall achievements like … leadership,” he said, adding that though the statistics may show slightly lower GPA or SAT scores for minority students, all of the applicants accepted are more than qualified for admission.
Vice Chancellor of Student Affairs Janina Montero said it is UC policy to admit students from the full spectrum of qualifications, not just those who are very academically qualified.
D’Artagnan Scorza, access coordinator for the African Student Union, said academic factors cannot be taken into account outside the context of a student’s achievements.
“Students who get admitted to UCLA still have to achieve in the context of their environment,” he said.
“The definition of merit unfortunately has been defined as GPA and SAT scores. … It doesn’t tell you how successful a student will be at UCLA,” he added.
Ramon said the gap in GPAs and SAT scores between underrepresented minorities and white and Asian students could be at least partially accounted for with grade inflation.
She said since students who come from more affluent schools typically have access to resources such as honors and Advanced Placement courses, it makes sense that they would have higher GPAs.
“When you look at studies of academic performance, they indicate that high school grades and standardized test scores explain less than one quarter of the variance of freshman GPAs across the UC campuses,” she said.
Montero said UCLA has access to a database that allows application readers to evaluate students in the context of their experiences because they can look at what high school each applicant came from and what courses the school offered.
She also said personal statements can be good tools for evaluating applicants, and the statement can be weighed based on how much information the applicant supplies.
But Connerly maintains the disparity in GPAs and SAT scores reveals a motive to increase minority students on campus artificially.
“There has never been any doubt in my mind that UCLA and Berkeley have been discriminating against Asians and whites in order to achieve diversity,” Connerly said.
With reports from Julia Erlandson and Jennifer Mishory, Bruin senior staff.