Chancellors Say Prop. 209 Would Hurt Education

Publicly airing their opposition to Proposition 209 for the first time, UCLA Chancellor Charles E. Young and UC Berkeley Chancellor Chang-Lin Tien together condemned the initiative Sunday, saying it would erode the quality of public higher education and send a hurtful message to California’s minority residents.

Taking care to speak as private citizens, not as University of California representatives, the chancellors said Proposition 209 would turn their campuses into bastions of Asian Americans and whites, cutting the attendance of blacks and Latinos--already a relatively small number--by at least half. Both chancellors said such a decrease would diminish the education of all students.

“UC Berkeley and UCLA are the two highest-quality public institutions in the world. They’re also the two most diverse. And it is not accidental that those two go together,” Young said at a news conference at the Ritz-Carlton, Huntington hotel in Pasadena. “A lot is learned from those you are studying with and living with and playing with. In every way, the two--quality and diversity--reinforce each other.”

Tien concurred. “Affirmative action may not be perfect, but we have not reached a level playing ground,” he said, predicting that Proposition 209 would hurt minorities and women. “We need to improve affirmative action, not eliminate it completely.”

Young and Tien became the highest ranking public college officials in California to speak out on the controversial initiative to repeal government affirmative action programs for women and minorities.

Neither UC President Richard C. Atkinson nor California State University Chancellor Barry Munitz have taken a position on the initiative, and the governing boards of both institutions also have remained mum.

Both Tien and Young have resigned effective July 1997. Asked whether that fact made them feel freer than their colleagues to speak out, Young and Tien said no.

“We would be making this statement whether we had announced our resignations or not,” Young said. “But are we expecting some heat? Yes.”

Asked how he expected the “heat” to affect him, Young replied: “Not very much.”

Just hours after Tien and Young’s news conference, held in a meeting room they had rented with their own funds, Gov. Pete Wilson issued a statement accusing the chancellors of seeking “to defend what is morally indefensible.”

“They are attempting to justify racial and sex discrimination,” Wilson said. “They evidently lack my confidence that young Californians of every race and ethnic group can--without favoritism, and on their own individual merit--win admission to UC and excel.”

The Yes on Proposition 209 campaign also sent a statement dismissing the chancellors’ prediction that the initiative would significantly decrease black and Latino enrollment as a “tacit admission of the extent to which racial preferences are practiced” at UC.

Although all nine UC chancellors opposed the UC Board of Regents’ decision last year to ban race and gender preferences at the university system, the statement noted, “Now only the two retiring chancellors have decided to ‘personally’ oppose the measure on the state ballot.”

Last month, the head of the initiative campaign, UC Regent Ward Connerly, charged that certain Cal State presidents were wrongly using state funds to oppose the ballot measure. In the wake of that criticism, Munitz, Cal State’s chancellor, cautioned his 23 campus heads against issuing a planned collective statement, urging them to speak out as individuals instead.

Some have done just that. Last week, the heads of about 100 private and public colleges declared their opposition to the measure, saying it would harm efforts to educate California’s diverse student population.

Cal State Bakersfield President Tomas Arciniega, who took a day off to ensure that his statement was seen as a personal one, said the ballot measure undercuts “efforts to address racial, ethnic and gender discrimination at precisely the wrong moment for the wrong reasons.”

Others who have spoken out against Proposition 209 include the heads of Mount St. Mary’s College, Occidental College, the Santa Monica Community College District and the Rancho Santiago Community College District in Orange County.

Private colleges would not be affected by Proposition 209, which is limited to state and local government. Nevertheless, Sister Karen M. Kennelly, president of Mount St. Mary’s College, said: “We have everything to lose by the spirit of this proposition.”

Students have also made their voices heard. In recent weeks, a series of rallies have been held on Cal State and UC campuses. The largest occurred last week at UC San Diego, when about 1,000 students turned out to hear Jesse Jackson and other Proposition 209 opponents. Student marches are planned this week in Los Angeles and Berkeley.

At Sunday’s news conference, UC Berkeley’s chancellor said he believed that it was his duty to speak out because he had experienced racism as a refugee from China. Coming as a student to the United States in the 1950s, Tien said: “I was called--even by my professors in class--a Chinaman.”

Although things have improved, such prejudice still exists, he said, adding that, even as chancellor, he has been jeered about his Chinese heritage. In the wake of the UC regents’ rollback of affirmative action, “I’ve visited urban inner-city schools,” he said. “Many students feel, ‘Why should I work anymore? I’m a second-class citizen.’ . . . I think 209 will have that kind of impact.”

Young predicted that if Proposition 209 is defeated, the UC regents will probably rescind their ban of race and gender preferences. “But if 209 passes, they not only will not, they cannot,” he said.

Well aware that there is strong support for the measure, Young lamented: “It’s very clear that people who ought to be listening to those of us who are responsible for higher education . . . are not listening.”