Blacks, Latinos Post Gains in Applying to UC

For the first time since the ban on affirmative action took effect, the percentage of black and Latino applicants to UC Berkeley, UCLA and UC San Diego has increased faster than the percentage of whites and Asian Americans, officials reported Wednesday.

Indeed, Latino applications to Berkeley have hit an all-time high. That marks a turnabout after a period of worries that the end of affirmative action in 1997 had convinced many minority high school students that they were no longer welcome at the most selective UC campuses.

The increase among blacks and Latinos outpaced an overall surge in applicants. UCLA received 37,460 applications--more than any other college in the nation--for the roughly 4,200 seats in its freshman class. Berkeley received 32,696 applications for its roughly 4,000 seats, a 5.1% increase and a record for the campus.

Berkeley officials attributed the turnaround to extra efforts the campus has made to recruit underprivileged students, particularly from black and Latino communities in Los Angeles and other urban centers.

“This is a good first step, but we have a lot of hard work to do,” said Richard Black, Berkeley’s acting assistant vice chancellor for admissions and enrollment. “We have to wait for admissions decisions,” he said, which will determine who actually makes the cut for Berkeley. Admissions officers hope to notify all applicants by April 1 about who has been admitted.

UCLA has also been reaching into minority communities to inspire more students to apply to the Westwood campus.

“We have worked very hard at attracting and recruiting these students and will continue to do so,” said Thomas E. Lifka, UCLA’s assistant vice chancellor for student academic services.

Ward Connerly, the UC regent who orchestrated the end of affirmative action, said the numbers suggest that UC critics who were fearing the resegregation of UC campuses were “crying Chicken Little prematurely.”

Still, he cautioned against making too much of year-to-year fluctuations in the numbers. “Only 20 years from now will we really know whether the change in policy has resulted in a different mixture of students who are applying,” he said.

Overall, more than 66,000 students applied to become freshmen at one or more of the University of California’s nine campuses, an increase of 4.4% over the previous year, according to preliminary figures released by the university president’s office. Officials have expected a steady increase as the children of baby boomers begin to reach college age.

In an ethnic breakdown systemwide, white students continued to dominate, with nearly 14,000 students seeking to join next fall’s freshman class. That was a 17% jump in applications over the previous year, according to preliminary figures distributed to the campuses.

Asian American applications were up about 10% systemwide, while blacks were up 4.7% and Chicanos and Latinos roughly 9%, according to the preliminary figures.

At UC Berkeley, applications from Latino students jumped by 20% this year to 3,382. African American applicants were up by 9.7% to 1,245.

By comparison, applications from Asian Americans increased by 7.3%, and whites were up only 0.8%.

Asian Americans made up the biggest group of applicants to Berkeley, with 12,390, followed closely by whites, who filed 11,385 applications. An additional 2,685 applicants declined to identify their ethnicity.

UCLA posted even more significant increases among African Americans--a 15.7% jump over last year for a total of 1,585 black applicants. Latinos shot up by 13.9%, filing a total of 4,689 applications.

Asian Americans, by comparison, increased by 6.5%, although once again this group has the largest number of applicants: 13,780. Applications from whites increased by 2.7% for a total of 12,207. An additional 2,739 students declined to identify their race or ethnicity.

At UC San Diego, applications from African American surged by 17% and from Latinos by nearly the same rate. Applications from Asian Americans went up 11.3% and white applications increased by only 3.3%. Overall freshman applications increased by 8.7%.

The exact figures will be released today with the official systemwide numbers.

The University of California promises seats for all California high school graduates who meet its entry requirements. But those students are not guaranteed a spot at the campus of their first choice. Given the popularity of UCLA, Berkeley and UC San Diego, all three campuses have had to turn away far more applicants than they accept.