Thursday, 4/17/97 Scholarships, campus tours are main devices
for recruitment University offers potential students many enticing
programs
By Mason Stockstill Daily Bruin Contributor As potential UCLA
freshmen take guided tours around campus, there is a distinct, yet
invisible demarcation among them: some of these students are being
recruited by UCLA and other schools, and some are not. What exactly
does UCLA do to recruit prospective students? Special programs, as
well as numerous scholarships and financial aid packages designed
to attract top high school students to UCLA, are expanding in
response to a more competitive college admissions environment. Some
independent admissions counselors claim that students offered
financial aid by universities can use higher offers from other
schools to barter with universities for more financial aid. While
this may hold true at some schools, Assistant Vice Chancellor and
Registrar Tom Lifka denies any claims that UCLA engages in any such
practices. "The mission of the school, and the UC system, is not
about meeting goals that were set for how many students of a
specific caliber we want to enroll," he said. "We have a process
that we use to determine how much aid is dispersed, and that
doesn’t include giving out more because another school did so,"
Lifka continued. Instead of increased financial aid, admissions
officers often let the campus speak for itself through a variety of
programs designed to entice prospective students into enrollment.
One of these programs is the Overnight Program, which began four
years ago as an attempt to help potential students experience life
at UCLA first-hand. "The overnight program is designed for top
scholars," says Andrea Sexton, an admissions assistant in the
Undergraduate Admissions and Relations with Schools office. High
school students participating in the overnight program spend two
days and one night with an undergraduate host. Students attend
class with their hosts, and stay a night in the residence halls.
The overnight program is offered free of charge and students
participating receive free meal tickets and UCLA memorabilia. Many
students from the Bay Area are invited because of the competition
between UCLA and UC Berkeley for prospective freshmen. "We send a
lot of invitations to students who normally couldn’t be able to
come to a regular tour, so a lot of invitations go to Northern
California students," Sexton said. This year, the program made an
effort to invite more students from the Los Angeles area to
participate. But while overnight stays often pique students’
interest in UCLA, scholarships and financial aid play an important
role in "helping" students decide where they want to go to college.
"There are many opportunities for students to obtain scholarships
at UCLA, from the Regents’ Scholarship to various other
scholarships that are sponsored by outside benefactors," Lifka
said. According to Lifka, there are literally hundreds of
scholarships available to incoming freshmen. Last year alone, the
Alumni Association awarded 146 alumni scholarships for incoming
freshmen. Over 450 students applied for scholarships available to
freshmen, which range in value from $500 to $10,000. Campus tours
are also a big part of the recruitment process, as a student’s
impression of the campus is often a deciding factor. "The campus
tour is often the last thing a student considers before deciding
where to enroll," said Vince Luk, campus tour coordinator. While
anyone can make reservations to take a walking tour of the campus,
students who have already been admitted to UCLA but are undecided
about their plans for the future have options available to them
that the general public does not, he said. These tours include the
standard look around campus, but students also have the opportunity
to hear more information about matters that concern the average
incoming freshman, such as financial aid, housing and scholarships.
The UCLA Alumni Association also offers its own campus tour for
students who have qualified for the association’s scholarships.
Generally, these students are higher achievers than the rest of the
admitted freshman class. The Alumni Association also offers
services to students it deems "highly able or highly able and
underrepresented," said Diana Wu, director of Student Recruitment
Programs for the Alumni Association. "We give the students the
opportunity to meet with alumni advisers" in addition to an
opportunity to apply for some of the scholarships the association
offers, she said.