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UC Berkeley Web Feature

Regents launch admissions task force, rebuke chairman over 'unfair' report

– The first meeting of the UC Board of Regents task force on student eligibility and admissions began with a promise: to develop a better way to communicate the university's admissions policies and to make those policies more efficient.

UC President Robert Dynes said the 15-member committee will not change the way the UC campuses do admissions, nor will it undermine comprehensive review. "The study group will help inform our future discussions" about admissions, Dynes said, and "develop a more thorough understanding of these issues."

Reports to the Regents
• President Dynes' status report on eligibility and admissions
• Regent Hopkinson's comments on admissions
• Chancellor Berdahl responds to the Moores' report

• Inside UC Berkeley admissions

The task force convened following the most rancorous meeting of the full board of regents in recent memory. In often stinging terms, several regents rebuked board chair John Moores for releasing an analysis of the admissions process at UC Berkeley that was "incomplete, inaccurate, and hurt students."

Regent Judith Hopkinson, reading from a prepared text because she said she was "too angry and too emotional to trust my memory," charged that Chairman Moore’s report confused the public and hurt the 386 students admitted to UC Berkeley in 2002 with SAT I scores under 1000. "The analysis and resulting media coverage suggests that this particular group of students is somehow unworthy of a UC education," Hopkinson said. "On the contrary, these are students who have achieved high grades in rigorous UC-approved course work … and once enrolled at UC succeed in their studies."

In their meeting at the UCLA campus, several regents echoed Hopkinson's theme that no matter his intent, Moore’s report had hurt students. "At the very minimum, a regent should do no harm," said Regent Tom Sayles, who called Moores' actions "unacceptable." Regent Ward Connerly, who was an early supporter of the Moores study, called its potential effect on students "unfair, unfortunate, and the worst thing we could do." Moores also was criticized for leaking his report to a newspaper. Regent George Marcus said, “Regents should think about the consequences of their actions to the university” before going public with any concern.

Appearing unmoved by the criticism, Moores in response was unapologetic. He insisted that the admissions process at UC Berkeley raised questions about whether it was "legal, transparent, or fair."

"The process is so opaque," he said, "we don’t know what we are doing. In a $15 billion operation like the University of California, we as regents don’t know even the basic information of how a student gets accepted."

Hopkinson pressed UC’s general counsel to investigate the legality of Moores’ use of the University seal and statement of copyright protection on the report he authored. Moores responded, "The copyright issue is extraordinarily silly."

Publicly and privately, many regents applauded UC Berkeley Chancellor Robert Berdahl’s response to the Moores report. Regent Laurence Seigler said a letter Berdhal sent to Moores focused their attention on the report’s affect on students. "Thank you for your leadership," Seigler said.

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