Posted on 06/03/2004 5:13:53 AM PDT by Max Combined
BERKELEY, Calif. - Sometimes, Adia Harrison looks around her classes at the University of California, Berkeley and is slightly surprised at the reminder: Just about no one else looks like her. This fall, being black at Berkeley is likely to become even more of an anomaly that it already is. As of late spring, 98 black students had registered for fall enrollment out of an expected class of 3,821.
AP Photo
"This is supposed to be a public university and it's not really representing the public," Harrison said.
Campus officials aren't sure what lies behind a nearly 30 percent decrease in black admissions this year.
Part of the explanation may go beyond the famously liberal school itself. Applications from black students were down about 10 percent here, and decreases in minority applications also were reported at the University of Michigan and Ohio State University.
Gary Orfield, co-director of The Civil Rights Project at Harvard University, said possible explanations include higher tuitions across the nation as well as publicity over a U.S. Supreme Court (news - web sites) ruling that struck down Michigan's system for giving admission preference based on race.
Berkeley recruiting efforts were further hurt, campus officials say, by new restrictions on their practice of flying students from predominantly minority high schools to campus for pre-application visits.
UC lawyers advised that targeting minority schools could violate Proposition 209, the 1996 voter-approved law banning the use of race in California college admissions, Berkeley spokesman George Strait said.
Berkeley officials don't agree with that interpretation and they are looking at ways to revive the visits.
"Virtually every part of the campus is extremely concerned about the low numbers of underrepresented minorities and, in particular, the appallingly low numbers of African-Americans," Strait said.
The fall enrollment figures came about six months after John Moores, chairman of UC's governing Board of Regents, issued a report saying Berkeley turned away thousands of students who aced the SAT but accepted hundreds — many of whom were black or Hispanic — with low scores.
After Moores wrote an opinion column in April saying UC policies victimized students, his fellow regents slapped him with a rare public censure. Regents also reaffirmed their commitment to UC's "comprehensive review" admissions, which don't consider race but do look at social factors, such as overcoming poverty, as well as grades and scores.
Still, the affair left some Berkeley students feeling undermined.
"The way a lot of the students feel is that the UC system and the administration has this rhetoric of celebrating diversity but they're not really following through with it," says Peter Tadeo Gee, a Berkeley student who works with a campus multicultural resources center.
Black student admissions have been low for some years.
In 1997, the last year affirmative action was allowed at UC's nine campuses, Berkeley admitted 562 black students. That number fell to 191 as the new race-blind policies took effect, but had risen to 338 by 2000.
But this fall, only 211 black students were admitted.
Renita Chaney, a junior and executive director of the campus Black Recruitment and Retention Center, said she would be reluctant to encourage black freshmen to attend this fall unless they want a challenge.
"If it's activism or some kind of fight they're looking for, then come here. But if education is what they're looking for, then don't come here," she said.
Toff Peabody, a Berkeley molecular biology major, was so struck by the new Berkeley numbers he joined a loosely organized group this spring that has been campaigning for a more diverse campus under the banner "White Males for Diversity."
"If the purpose of school was to just go to lectures we could all stay home and watch them on the Internet," Peabody said. "It's the actual interaction you have with other students that makes my education better at Berkeley than somewhere else."
As of fall 2003, whites accounted for about 30 percent of undergraduates, with Asian Americans, who also did not benefit under the old affirmative action programs, comprising about 40 percent. (Berkeley's definition of Asian American is broad, including people with ties to the Pacific Islands and countries such as India.)
Proposition 209 supporters say it's a mistake to focus on race or ethnicity — that keeping a close tally of demographics only serves to create barriers.
"Don't go there thinking, 'I'm going to be looking around for other black kids,'" says Ward Connerly, a part-black UC regent who led the fight to drop race-based admissions. "Go there and recognize that it's going to be one of the greatest experiences of your life. You're there to meet new people. You're there to learn. You're not there to engage in this racial, 'Mirror, mirror on the wall' kind of thing."
But for Harrison, knowing there'll be fewer black students on campus next year is a little unsettling.
"People are going to notice even more that there's not very many African-American people. Not only the African-American students will notice it," she says.
Still, she doesn't regret coming to Berkeley: "It's a good school, and I know eventually, no matter how difficult it is, I'll be able to get through."
Or a Broncos jersey.
Yep, even the executive director of the campus Black Recruitment and Retention Center can't recommend the school to blacks who want to get an education.
Obviously the administration is a pack of racists.
Ain't that the truth, APPY PAPPY.
BTW, I like your tag line.
"Especially if you happen to be of a skin color that makes you look more "stupid"."
What the heck does that mean?
Ask Bill Cosby.
I imagine that the poster was referring to how black students are looked at as being stupid just because they're black. I believe another poster in this thread was trying to say JUST that but with lots of big stupid words like 'behavioral disparities'.
"This black girl probably grew up in a black neighborhood and is in a white environment for the first time. Nothing wrong with her feeling intimidated."
By the numbers, she is in an Asian, not a white, environment for the first time.
There is nothing wrong with her feeling intimidated, but there is something wrong with her wanting Cal to admit more blacks so that she does not feel so intimidated. She should either work to get over her feelings of intimidation so that in the future she feels comfortable being in groups made up of various racial and ethnic groups or she should go to a school that has more blacks in its student population, if that is so important to her.
Probably more individual attention from Profs, anyway.
I hired a WASP guy out of Berkeley about 15 years ago from Indiana. He got his BS from Wabash State, his MS from Purdue and his PhD from Berkeley. He had a 3.9 on every course he ever took anywhere. His PhD was in theoretical chemistry.
"Virtually every part of the campus is extremely concerned about the low numbers of underrepresented minorities and, in particular, the appallingly low numbers of African-Americans," Strait said.
Are they underrepresented based on academic achievement? If so, then we have a problem. If not, then so what?
Without AA there is no reason to look at anyone at the same school with anything other than respect.
It is affirmative action that causes some to suspect that those from groups that receive affirmative action are not up to speed with those who do not get preferences in admissions.
I guess.
I wouldn't choose Berkeley myself --- so I can't blame the blacks who don't choose it. They should write an article on all the blacks who are working their way through college and you see them at the community colleges, here it seems to be a disportionate number of blacks in the community college --- many have jobs or are in the military and are doing just fine. Lots working in the hospitals too -- perfectly comfortably middle class.
You know hard working black students doesn't make for much news in the large liberal media.
I wrote underrepresented, not non-existent.
Sounds like you hired a bright guy. Did he work out for you?
I agree... but I've never looked down on anyone. I really don't care.
You would think that the large shift to middle class by blacks --- so that now something like 3/4 are middle class (depending on where you place the cut-off line), many from very humble backgrounds who in one or two generations moved into the middle class --- you'd think there'd be some news in that but they want to focus on the negatives.
They don't want to hear that. Unfortunately negative reports sells news.
Yup. He replaced me when I retired from TI. (They really did need someone a lot smarter than me to do that job, lol.)
TEN YEARS AGO: Robert is a black kid growing up in the Los Angeles suburbs. He's a good kid. He's no valdictorian, but he studies reasonably hard and makes mostly B's, with an A thrown in here and there. He has a good head for math and building things, and wants to become an engineer.
As a senior, he's not sure what to do. Berkeley hears about him, and gets him a plane ticket to fly to campus. Figuring it's a chance to see the bay area, he accepts. He is wined and dined by the Black Students League. Feeling at home, he puts in his appplication for Berkeley.
His SAT scores and grades are far less than the average for applying students. The Admissions Office adds many points for the fact that Robert is black.
Robert gets to Berkeley for his freshman year and starts taking intro. engineering classes. His classmates include Westinghouse Science Winners and people who had begun taking calculus in their sophomore year of high school. Robert doesn't have the background to keep up. He gets discouraged and fails out after one year.
TODAY: A boy named Dean has the same background as Robert. This time, Berkeley isn't paying for any plane tickets. Dean enrolls in U. Cal Irvine. He is now on a more even footing and keeps a B average in the introductory engineering classes.
Other than the sanctimonious bean-counters, who exactly is really helped by affirmative action?
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