Who gets in to UC?
Re “UC’s diverse enrollment lags at its top schools,” July 1
As a UCLA alumnus and a former lecturer there, I know that diversity is part of what always made the University of California system excel. Moreover, fairness demands that the university’s student body reflect the general California population and the makeup of in-state applicants.
I know UC has been struggling to boost underrepresented minority enrollment ever since Proposition 209 passed in 1996. California went from one extreme — affirmative action — to the other: no action. UC deserves praise for partly mitigating affirmative action’s demise by adopting a more holistic application process, which has done much to level the playing field. But it hasn’t done enough. UC could do more. The U.S. Supreme Court, in sending an affirmative action case from Texas back to lower courts, has left the door open for innovative approaches that stop short of simple racial quotas. A fair compromise would be for UC to set a bare minimum for each racial group, after which an “emergency” policy would kick in.
This would probably satisfy the Supreme Court.
Jeff Drobman
Westlake Village