UC Berkeley Panel Handles Admission Requests by VIPs

UC Berkeley, one of the nation’s premier public institutions, has operated its own special admissions program for students whose names were forwarded by VIPs ranging from a U.S. senator to the UC regent now leading the charge against affirmative action, according to documents released Wednesday.

More than 200 students were given “some special consideration” by a committee set up to review the highly sensitive requests. And records show that 19 students who would not otherwise have been admitted were provided undergraduate slots since 1993.

Among those making the requests was Regent Ward Connerly, champion of the anti-affirmative action initiative on the state’s November ballot. He is listed as the “advocate” this year for two students who were admitted.

Connerly said Wednesday he was unaware that the students’ names had been forwarded to the special review committee on the Berkeley campus after he handed their applications to the campus chancellor during a regents meeting.

“The mere fact that those letters passed through my hands creates the impression that some sort of influence was sought, when in fact none was,” Connerly said. “I literally gave them to the chancellor and said, ‘Do what you want with them.’ I didn’t follow up.”

Asked whether he would provide similar assistance to applicants in the future, Connerly said he would not. “I don’t think it’s appropriate,” he said, adding that he favors disbanding the special review committee.

Campus administrators said the special committee did not intervene in either case forwarded to them by Connerly, a Sacramento land-use consultant who was appointed by Gov. Pete Wilson.

UC officials acknowledged that since the early 1980s they have employed a special five-member committee to review admissions requests made by high-ranking UC officials and faculty members, state and federal legislators, donors and others. Among those making requests, records show, were 28 present and former regents, 17 members of the state Legislature and three members of Congress, including Sen. Bill Bradley (D-N.J.).

During the last four years, Berkeley officials say, they fielded 240 special requests--and in 204 cases, the applications ran a natural course with no intervention.

Records do not show how many of the students got admitted on their own. University officials said that a third of the applicants were so strong that they already were scheduled for admission. Yet dozens of other VIP applicants had high school grade-point averages of less than 3.5--substantially below the 3.8 average for freshmen admitted in 1993.

In 19 cases, the committee’s intervention made the difference for students who would have been turned away from the fiercely competitive campus, although some of them had grade-point averages of 4.0 or above. Others were classified as hardship cases.

“If these cases were not reviewed, the likelihood is that they would have been denied,” John Cummins, an assistant chancellor at Berkeley, said in an interview Wednesday.

Still other requests, including one by the finance minister of Taiwan and then-San Francisco Mayor Frank Jordan, were given “courtesy handling,” UC officials said. For example, some students who were denied admission to the desirable fall class were automatically admitted to the spring class without having to reapply.

The UC records, obtained by The Times through a Public Records Act request, were compiled as part of the campus’s response to the university president’s investigation of such practices.

In a statement Wednesday, Chancellor Chang-Lin Tien said: “All institutions of higher education need some flexibility to take actions and make decisions that benefit the university as a whole. And Berkeley uses its discretion in this area sparingly and responsibly.”

In an earlier interview, Tien noted that out of 25,000 applications for admission, “there are some special cases.” He said that some requests are for disabled or ill students, not just for those with ties to the state’s movers and shakers.

Tien also confirmed that in 1991 he made a request to UCLA officials on behalf of a retired business executive who headed a major Berkeley fund-raising drive.

“I didn’t say anything except to give [the student’s] application careful consideration . . . and we didn’t even follow up,” Tien said. Records show that the student was admitted in the winter of 1992, ahead of more than 3,500 others with better grade-point averages and Scholastic Aptitude Test scores.

The issue of admissions favoritism flared into a public controversy last month when The Times reported that several UC regents who voted to roll back affirmative action admissions had privately used their positions to get relatives, friends and the children of their business partners into UCLA, sometimes ahead of hundreds of better qualified applicants.

Those requests were among nearly 1,300 made by hundreds of public officeholders, donors and other prominent boosters since 1980 to UCLA on behalf of undergraduate applicants, The Times found. More than 200 of the VIP applicants were admitted after they had been initially rejected or coded for denial, confidential records show.

At UCLA, the VIP requests were funneled through Chancellor Charles E. Young’s office or the school’s fund-raising staff to admissions officers, who flagged the well-connected candidates before making their decisions.

The system at UC Berkeley was different, however, because it was formalized in a committee that included faculty representation and the vice chancellor for admissions. If the committee deadlocked, the matter could be appealed to Tien.

“At least [Berkeley officials] are out in the open about it,” Regent Ralph Carmona said in an interview Wednesday. “They get tremendous pressure in terms of financial support.

“There’s alumni who support Berkeley . . . that invites inevitable pressures for preferences for relatives or friends in admissions.”

Chancellor Tien recalled that Regent Connerly passed two requests directly to him. In one case, Tien said, Connerly “gave me a name and then resume-type information and said, ‘Please take a look.’ ”

Both requests, Connerly told The Times, were on behalf of friends. Records show that one applicant was a Santa Monica woman who had a 4.39 high school grade-point average, an elevated score because of advanced placement courses. The other was a transfer student from Diablo Valley College who had a 2.60 average and was deemed ineligible because he had too many junior college credits. Each was admitted.

Connerly said that Berkeley’s VIP review committee should be abolished and all admissions request handled in the same manner, no matter which powerful person indicates interest.

“This story reveals that there are a lot of things we’re doing by-gosh and by-golly,” the regent said. “I didn’t know there was any special committee at Berkeley, or any other place. And I certainly didn’t know people were keeping notes on who was brought in by the regents.”

Other requests came from major donors, including Lowell Milken, president of the Santa Monica-based Milken Family Foundation, which has given the campus nearly $1 million.

In 1993, Milken--brother of fallen junk bond trader Michael Milken, made a request on behalf of an unidentified undergraduate, records show.

The student, who would have otherwise been denied, was admitted to the fall 1993 term. Milken did not return a call late Wednesday seeking comment.

A year later, records show, Berkeley admitted another student to the spring term at the request of UC Regent Howard Leach of San Francisco, who could not be reached for comment. Without the VIP contact, records indicate, the student would have probably been passed over for spring admission.

The same applied to a student admitted for spring 1996 after the university was contacted by Sen. Bradley, the records show.

Bradley and Tien both serve on the Domestic Strategy Group, an Aspen, Colo.-based think tank that discusses domestic problems and convenes twice a year, said Dan Maffei, a spokesman for the New Jersey Democrat.

Although Berkeley officials say Bradley’s request was for an undergraduate applicant, Maffei said a check of congressional files shows that the senator wrote on behalf of a former congressional staffer who wanted to get into the graduate school of public policy.

“We didn’t ask for any special treatment of consideration, certainly not because he’s a senator or who he is,” Maffei said.

One donor whose request made a difference was Martin Wingren, a Bay Area businessman and Berkeley graduate who has created foundations for the university, set up intern programs for graduates and served as a trustee of the business school.

Wingren said he often makes inquiries on behalf of prospective students. “I’m probably more likely to have my calls returned by the chancellor than Bob Smith” is, he said.

Wingren said he was not aware that the university had a formal system for dealing with inquiries from VIPs but saw nothing wrong with officials giving special consideration to “some who have been helpful to the university over the years.”

“There’s got to be some judgment in the system,” Wingren said.

Gladstone reported from Sacramento, Frammolino from Los Angeles. Times staff writer Virginia Ellis contributed to this story.