Diversity v. Money
In an effort to raise money, the University of California at Berkeley plans to admit fewer in-state students next fall and enroll more out-of-state students. This, some say, will reduce the percentage of “underrepresented minority students” on campus. (Source)
Budget shortfalls mean schools have to decide which is more important: more brown faces for the brochure and less money, or fewer brown faces and more money. If the school opts for more funds, the percentage of blacks could drop by 13 percent and Hispanics by close to 18 percent, as these groups tend to fall near the admissions “cutoff point.” An excerpt:
The potential for a decline in Berkeley’s racial and economic diversity has drawn criticism from some faculty members and others who believe the university should retain its focus on California residents in spite of the budget cuts…Christopher Newfield, an English professor at the University of California at Santa Barbara, said in an e-mail that the political cost of enrolling many nonresident students would outweigh the financial benefits. Berkeley officials believe new revenue from nonresident tuition will fill about 15 percent of the campus’s budget gap next year.
Mr. Newfield said it would be better to get the money by imposing a temporary surcharge on all students—a proposal unlikely to sit well with students who will already be paying for a 32-percent increase in tuition. Relying on nonresident tuition, he said, is “more of the California fantasy that somebody else will pay to fix this.”
By law, Berkeley is barred from admitting or denying applicants based on race, but there’s a workaround. The school admits students under a “comprehensive review” process that takes into account an applicant’s “personal qualities” and “[l]ikely contributions to the intellectual and cultural vitality of the campus.” (Source)
This process, apparently, increases diversity.
