Editorial: Connerly’s proposal harmful for students, UC

The UC regents will be at UCLA today for one of their rare
meetings on a campus with an undergraduate population and a vocal
student voice. Under consideration is a flawed proposal put forth
by Regent Ward Connerly to add a multi-ethnic check box to the UC
application.

The regents will also vote on how to fund financial aid and
decide whether to preemptively raise tuition for 2005-06. (After
years of student fee increases, the UC can no longer expect people
to avoid the word “tuition”).

When it comes to the UC application, Connerly is right to call
for reforming the way in which the UC asks students to identify
their ethnicities. But his proposal to add a simple
“multi-ethnic” check box will not fix any real
problems.

The current form allows applicants to check as many boxes as
desired, but federal regulations require the UC to officially
report only one ethnicity per student.

Rather than letting students indicate a preference, the UC
simply defaults the student into the most underrepresented
category. Thus, a student picking both white and black would
automatically be placed in the black category, inflating those
numbers.

Another oddity with the current application is that Middle
Easterners are expected to check the “white/Caucasian”
box. While many Middle Easterners may technically be Caucasian,
this grouping makes it seem as if the white/Caucasian group is
significantly more homogeneous than it really is ““ the UC
numbers offer no information about what percentage of students come
from European countries versus the Middle East.

Connerly’s proposed multi-ethnic box would only harm the
University’s ability to collect ethnic data. Many students of
mixed ethnicity would select the box, and simply vanish into a
single large melting pot category.

At this meeting, the regents should shelve Connerly’s
idea, but the issue should be revisited soon.

Also on the agenda is a decision on how financial aid will be
funded next year. The UC used to allocate 33 percent of student
fees to fund financial aid. Much of that aid money was used to
cover the increase for lower and middle income families. But that
number was changed to 20 percent in the most recent round of hikes
and needs to be raised. Even though the proposal would only
allocate 25 percent, it’s a much needed start.

Finally, a decision to implement already planned tuition hikes
should occur. Student representatives, including UCLA’s
Undergraduate Students Association Council, have called for a delay
on the vote ““ but a delay would serve little purpose.

The UC and Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger have agreed to a long-term
funding plan, and there is little hope that a tuition increase
could be avoided. Even though higher tuition isn’t in the
interest of students, the UC must break its habit of erratic and
dramatic increases.

While far from an ideal, at least the recent compact with the
governor is forthcoming about future hikes. Current and future
students deserve a complete financial picture so they can budget
for their education.