UC Raising Admissions Standards to Cut Costs : Education: Changes requiring better grades and test scores beginning in 1992 would keep about 4,500 students a year out.

University of California officials Thursday announced a tightening of freshman admissions standards as a way to slow enrollment growth and cut costs.

The changes in required grades and test scores would eliminate about 4,500 students from the estimated 35,750 California high school graduates who now are eligible for UC entrance annually, said Dennis Galligani, UC assistant vice president for student academic services. About 21,000 freshman enrolled last year, and that figure will grow in the near future, although at a slower rate because of the tougher admissions rules, he added.

The new standards go into effect for applicants for entrance in the fall of 1992.

UC officials described the changes as modest. But some UC regents, who were meeting at UC Irvine, and student leaders questioned the plan’s effect on minorities.

Helen Henry, the UC Riverside biochemistry professor who headed the systemwide faculty group that came up with the new rules, insisted the changes are “small enough not to affect the ethnic composition (of the student body) in any significant way.”

But Bill Kysella, vice president of the UC Student Assn., contended that “even a change as small as this one . . . could have serious repercussions on the diversity of UC’s entering class.”

Because a 40% UC fee increase slated for the fall is expected to cause some drop in enrollment, the new eligibility rules may be “overkill tactics,” Kysella said.

By instituting the new rules and other enrollment-cutting measures, the regents hope to save $35 million next year as part of their effort to bring the budget down to $2.2 billion, said UC spokesman Ron Kolb.

The new standards will not change the policy ensuring entrance to any California applicant with a 3.3 grade-point average in the high school courses required by the university, regardless of their standardized test scores. Only students with GPAs below 3.3 will be affected.

For example, under the complicated sliding formula for admission, a student with a 3.0 GPA in the UC-required high school courses now needs a score of 1,080 on the Scholastic Aptitude Test out of a possible 1,600. Under the new rules, a student with a 3.0 GPA will need an SAT total of 1,170.

An applicant with an 1,100 SAT now needs a 2.99 GPA grade but will need a 3.028 GPA next year.

UC traditionally admits a small number of students based on test scores alone. In those cases, the minimum SAT score will rise from 1,100 to 1,300.

The new standards are for admission into the UC system, not for a student’s campus or major of first choice. In practice, the most popular schools, like UCLA and UC Berkeley, have much higher thresholds.

The tougher formula was developed and approved by the Faculty Senate’s Board of Admissions and Relations with Schools at the request of the regents, who were seeking ways to cope with the severe state budget crunch. The rules were presented at the regents’ meeting Thursday, but no formal vote was required.

Along with cuts in graduate programs and the fee increase, the move is expected to hold overall UC enrollment at the current 165,000 over the next four years, about 5,500 fewer than had been anticipated.

Under state policy, UC is supposed to admit students from the top academic 12.5% of high school graduates statewide. In recent years, UC had been taking students from the top 14.3%. Thursday’s announcement was to start enforcing the 12.5% policy again with specific GPAs and test scores.

In other action, the BOARS group decided not to add a fourth year of mathematics, presumably calculus, to the UC-required high school courses. Henry, the panel’s head, said that improving basic math skills is more important than forcing students into calculus.

But Regent Jeremiah Hallisey, the strongest proponent of the extra math, criticized the decision, saying it would lower the number of students going into needed technical and scientific careers.

“I’ve heard 500 times that this is the most prestigious institution in the world. But we don’t have the political courage to set some standards,” Hallisey said.

Last year, the regents moved to require high school students starting with 1994 applicants to take a second year of social science and a second year of lab science, on top of four years of English, three of math, two of a foreign language.

UC Irvine Student Fees

Current Year 1991-92 Acad Undergraduate Graduate Undergraduate University registration fee $642 $642 $693 Educational fee 903 903 1,581 Associated Students fee 39 27 39 UCI Student Center fee 142 142 142 Bren Events 69 69 69 Graduate student ---- 380 ---- health insurance fee TOTAL 1,795 2,163 2,524

emic Year* Graduate University registration fee $693 Educational fee 1,581 Associated Students fee 27 UCI Student Center fee 142 Bren Events 69 Graduate student 498 health insurance fee TOTAL 3,010

* 1991-92 fee increases approved by UC Board of Regents in February, 1991.

Registration for fall quarter, 1991, opens May 28

Source: UC Irvine Registrar’s office