Editorial: Next UC president has big shoes to fill

Now that University of California President Richard Atkinson has
announced his resignation, the university faces the daunting task
of finding a replacement able to continue guiding the UC through
the changes he implemented.

As an active and aggressive president, Atkinson has worked to
ensure university diversity and equal accessibility to education.
For these reasons, he favors affirmative action and supported the
repealing of SP-1 and -2 ““ UC policies disallowing the use of
race in hiring and admissions decisions ““ in May 2001. But
since California law also bans affirmative action under Proposition
209, the rescinding of the two measures was mostly symbolic.

Atkinson’s commitment to making the UC accessible to
students with difficult backgrounds or from subpar schools has
never been deterred by affirmative action’s ban. The
president has oriented the UC through a thorough rethinking of its
admissions policies.

In 2001 Atkinson’s dual admissions program passed,
guaranteeing a place in the UC system for everyone in the top 12.5
percent of their high school class, with the condition that they
complete the appropriate requirements at a junior college if not
during high school. Later that year, he helped guide the
introduction of comprehensive review into the admissions process
systemwide. Under comprehensive review, UC applicants’ life
challenges are given consideration along with their academic and
personal achievements in making an admissions decision.

This will likely help increase the number of students from
difficult socioeconomic backgrounds, who often face disadvantages
in the number of advanced placement courses their schools provide
and the amount of private test preparation materials and schooling
they can afford. A fairly strong correlation exists between
socioeconomic difficulty and belonging to a minority group, so the
comprehensive review admissions system may also increase diversity
on such color-lacking campuses as UCLA and UC Berkeley.

Atkinson didn’t just help reform the UC’s admissions
policies, he also fomented a national debate over the utility and
fairness of standardized testing ““ he proposed that the
university stop using the SAT I completely. Terrified at the
prospect of losing their largest customer, the testing service
which administers the SAT changed the test based on the concerns
Atkinson raised. The old SAT I carried with it a lot of stigma,
namely because students could easily prepare for it through
repetitive memorization exercises and with expensive tutors and
study aids many can’t afford.

Other problems Atkinson has helped guide the UC through but that
will persist for years to come include overcrowding and funding
problems. Under Atkinson, UC Merced was approved and its
construction began, but the campus has yet to be completed.

Not only will the next UC president have to cope with even more
overcrowding and budget challenges, he or she will also be
responsible for making sure the admissions and testing reform
Atkinson started is continued and improved upon. The next UC
president will have to challenge the state government regarding the
funding Gov. Gray Davis agreed to give the UC if it accepted more
students; the UC has done its part, now the state needs to live up
to its end of the bargain.

The regents need to select someone vigorous to be the next
president. But most importantly, the regents need to select someone
who has the same ideals as Atkinson and the intellectual and
lobbying skills to carry them out given the great challenges the UC
will face in upcoming years.