UC Admissions, Affirmative Action

Re “Why Not a Lottery to Get Into UC?,” Commentary, Jan. 24:

Norman Matloff’s suggested lottery system would cause many students who are in the top of their classes, and best prepared for a challenging college experience, to be denied entrance simply due to a random number assigned to them. Randomly denying admission to the best qualified applicant is hardly fair. Matloff suggests that it “makes no sense to admit one applicant over another simply because the first applicant had slightly higher test scores.” How then can it make sense to include one student in a lottery over another, when the first applicant may have just slightly higher scores? This system would allow applicants to achieve the minimal required grades and scores, rather than encouraging them to do their very best.

DAN CAPLAN

Junior, UCLA

* The way Matloff’s article was written, one would think that SAT I was the only admissions criterion for acceptance. I have a senior applying to the UCs, and we were informed that the admissions index consisted of (GPA x 1000) plus SAT I plus three subject tests (SAT II). Of the possible total 7,400 points, SAT I only takes up 1,600. The rest of what is measured is the result of just plain old-fashioned hard work by the student.

Matloff suggests that once an applicant pool has been narrowed based on “some threshold values,” a lottery should be used for selecting students. I would like to ask Matloff one question: What do you plan to do with the top 30-50% of our students who may be able to reach this threshold without any effort?

We already have a society full of adults who look at lotteries as an alternative to hard work. Do we need another segment of our population wishful-thinking away these productive high school years because their future will be determined by luck? Once again another educator is trying to bring down the standards in the name of fairness.

TERESE INHAE HALL

Seal Beach

* Re “End Race-Based Admissions, UC Regent Suggests,” Jan. 20:

As a concerned college-bound senior, I am appalled by such a proposal. If passed, this measure could set society back by decades. The purpose of affirmative action is to allow minorities opportunities they otherwise might not be afforded. Many minorities lack essential advantages and resources, making it harder for them to succeed.

By taking away affirmative action, the UC regents will be making diversity virtually impossible on their campuses. Diversity is desirable; it attracts the best and the brightest of every type of student.

Everyone in California deserves representation in our state universities. By abruptly ending a system that has just begun to take effect in our society, the UC would be doing its students, its citizens, a great injustice.

BRANDEE BUTLER

Hawthorne

* It was with wonderment that I heard the report that UC regents are seriously considering abandoning affirmative action. The Bakke decision of 1978 didn’t even slow them down. This is like a breath of fresh air. If they don’t act now, the voters will do it (get rid of affirmative action) for them in 1996, so it is well that they act while there is time to be a leader. Society needs to reward accomplishment, not the lack thereof.

ROBERT MILLER

Newport Beach