GPA, SAT scores wrongly emphasized in admissions

As the University of California considers reevaluating its
admission policies, many argue that schools like UCLA should not
adjust their current policies. Many people believe that the system
used now accurately predicts future academic performance in
college.

However, I believe a high GPA and SAT scores, which are often
weighed most heavily when determining admissions, do not
necessarily ensure a students’ success when they enter a
competitive university such as UCLA. I use myself as an example. I
applied and was admitted to UCLA as a senior in high school with a
3.9 GPA (unweighted) and a 940 SAT score. Now, I have a 3.5 GPA and
am preparing myself to enter law school in the fall of 2005.

According to some people’s logic, I do not deserve to be
here and I should have flunked out of school a long time ago. Such
arguments are reminiscent of social Darwinism. Personally, I do not
believe I am an exception to the rule and I feel that there are
other disadvantaged minority students who can succeed when given
the opportunity and rise to the level of competition as I did.

It is problematic for college admissions officers to weigh GPA
and SAT so heavily in determining admissions. The quality of
education received by all students is not equal. Predominantly
white middle-class and upper middle-class high schools have more
resources and better teachers than their inner city, minority
counterparts. Some high schools have teachers with postgraduate
degrees, master’s degrees and doctorates. Many inner city
high schools suffer from inadequate resources, unmotivated teachers
and overcrowding. Often teachers in inner city schools only have
emergency credentials and don’t have expertise in one
designated subject matter, let alone a general understanding of a
broad range of subject matter. Most inner city high schools do not
provide an environment that is conducive to learning. For a person
to successfully matriculate through such an environment is truly an
accomplishment.

UCLA’s current admissions policies, and those of many
other universities for that matter, are inherently flawed because
they act as if everyone has received the same type of education and
that the playing field is somehow level. Admitting students this
way is like expecting a man with shackles around his legs to run
the 100-yard dash at the same speed as a man with two free,
unconstrained legs. It is an unrealistic expectation.

If a student goes to a high school where his teachers have been
preparing him for the SAT since he was in the ninth grade and his
parents paid for him to take a SAT prep course, it would be
illogical not to expect him to do better on the SAT than a student
who was not afforded those same luxuries. Essentially, many argue
that GPA and SAT scores are indicators of intelligence when in
reality they are just indicators of specialized preparation.

Moving toward a more holistic evaluation process at UCLA would
be an acknowledgment on the university’s part that a segment
of our society is still running the race with shackles on its legs.
And until those shackles can be removed from the feet of all our
society’s runners, admissions officers should take into
account that such handicaps exist while making admissions
decisions.

Finally, I take personal offense to a letter to the editor
“Current admission process is fair” written by Troy
Masters (Nov. 18). Commenting on a prior submission, Masters wrote,
“Turner concludes by saying that if he were a black student
with a GPA above 4.0 and a SAT score above 1300, he would go to an
Ivy League school over UCLA. The irony, of course, is that a white
or Asian student would have no chance of getting into an Ivy League
school with those scores.”

Masters’ statement suggests that in order for black
students to get into prestigious institutions such as Harvard or
Yale, the schools have to lower their academic standards. The last
time I checked, a 4.0-plus GPA and a 1300 SAT score would make any
high school student, at the very least, competitive enough to be
considered for admissions in our society’s top institutions
of higher learning. Furthermore, most Ivy League schools want a
student body with diversity ““ and this includes academic
diversity. No school wants their campus to be populated by clones
or students that are exact facsimiles of one another. Masters seems
to believe that all students, non-minority at least, who attend
Harvard, Yale or even UCLA, have a 1600 SAT score and 4.0 GPA; this
is simply not the case.

Many of the students who attend Harvard, Yale and UCLA do not
meet Masters’ high standards ““ including white and
Asian students. I felt Masters’ comments were racially
insensitive. Instead of focusing on how unqualified some minority
college applicants are, Masters should ask himself why those
applicants are unqualified.

Often, minority college applicants are “unqualified”
because they receive a lesser quality of education in comparison to
their white middle- and upper middle-class counterparts. Therefore,
it is unfair for college admission decisions to be based so heavily
on GPAs and SAT scores. College admission policies should be
modified to account for the academic inequality that exists in our
society.

Lindsey is a fourth-year sociology student.