Diversity
law complicates grad school policies Diversity
law complicates grad school policies
02/25/2002
By LINDA K. WERTHEIMER
The Dallas Morning News
The University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas used to automatically reject applicants with lousy grades and low test scores. It's not that easy anymore. Because of a new state law, the admissions process is more complicated for the medical school and for all graduate schools in Texas. The measure, passed in June, says graduate programs may not use test scores as the sole or primary factor in admissions.
New considerations
According to a new law, graduate schools in Texas may no longer use standardized test scores as the primary factor in admissions or scholarship decisions. Instead, the law says, colleges may consider: High school and college academic records. Socioeconomic background during elementary and secondary school and college.
Proficiency in more than one language. Responsibilities while attending elementary and secondary school and college, including whether the applicant worked and helped raise children. Region of residence and where the applicant lived during high school, to allow for geographic diversity. Community activities.
A demonstrated commitment to a particular field in college. Whether the person's hometown has a shortage of professionals in the medical or law fields, if the applicant is applying to medical or law school. The applicant's interview. Whether the applicant was automatically admitted to a university under the state's top 10 percent law.
Comparing the applicant's performance on test scores with students from similar socioeconomic backgrounds. Instead, the law throws in 11 other factors schools must consider, including applicants' hometowns and whether they grew up in poverty. The law is now having its biggest effect, as schools are scrambling to weed through applications for the next school year. Some officials say the process hasn't been easy.
In medical schools, officials have long considered entrance exam scores an indicator of a student's likely success on medical licensing tests, said Scott Wright, director of admissions at UT Southwestern. Now, it's just one of many factors to consider. "We're trying to walk on a path that's a difficult one," Dr. Wright said.
"We want to make sure we can enroll students who can make it through the curriculum and become outstanding physicians." Dr. Wright said the school's new policy is to make the first applicant cut based on grades. Good grades and high test scores will earn a pass in the second cut, which gets applicants an interview. Students who don't meet that standard will get an interview based on other factors, such as background.
Not everyone is a fan of looking beyond aptitude in graduate school admissions, saying it's a step toward the affirmative-action admissions that were banned in 1996. Elizabeth Perkins, a teacher working on her master's degree at the University of Texas at Dallas, said economic status shouldn't be considered. "At the graduate level, it shouldn't matter," Ms. Perkins said. Rep. Irma Rangel, D-Kingsville, chairwoman of the House Higher Education Committee, said she proposed the law to give graduate schools a tool to admit a more diverse group of students.
"This is definitely not affirmative action," Ms. Rangel said. "This is just something that will assist them to look at a larger group of students." The debate about affirmative action in Texas began at the graduate- school level in 1992, when a group of white University of Texas law school applicants sued, saying they lost spots to less-qualified minorities.
In 1996, the so-called Hopwood case resulted in Texas universities being banned from using race or ethnicity as a factor in admissions. The following year, the Legislature passed a law that required undergraduate universities to automatically admit students who graduated in the top 10 percent of their high school class.
Until the new law, there was no such attempt to encourage diversity in graduate schools. Graduate school officials say they've been at a disadvantage against other states because they've been unable to recruit minority students with fellowships. Ms. Rangel said she has been dismayed by the continued scarcity of blacks and Hispanics in graduate schools.
Statewide in 2000, 4 percent of students in doctoral programs were black. Six percent were Hispanic, and 55 percent were white. About 30 percent were from abroad. De-emphasizing test scores, Ms. Rangel said, should give economically disadvantaged students a better chance at getting into graduate programs.
At the University of North Texas, admission policies vary by graduate school since the new law. The college's business program previously would reject applicants who didn't meet minimum requirements for test scores and grades, said Neal Tate, dean of UNT's Toulouse School of Graduate Studies.
Dr. Tate said the business school is trying to figure out a new policy. "What we've tried to emphasize is the spirit of the bill is captured in the notion that nobody should be cut off from consideration solely by a test score," Dr. Tate said. But there are complications as universities try to interpret the law, he said.
The law says colleges may compare a student's test score only with students from similar socioeconomic backgrounds, provided schools are able to gather such information. Officials at UNT and the University of Texas at Dallas say they've been unable to collect what they view as reliable data on socioeconomic status. UTD takes many things into account, including a student's performance as an undergraduate, said Austin Cunningham, dean of graduate studies.
The law is a positive move, said Robert Nelsen, a UTD creative writing professor, chairman of the faculty advisory council for the UT System. "I see it as the Hopwood remedy," Dr. Nelsen said. "It's more sophisticated than the top 10 percent law. The top 10 percent is just another number.. . We should be looking at the whole person."
The University of Texas at Austin is trying to group students based on their socioeconomic status and test scores, but it's a difficult task, said Teresa Sullivan, vice president and dean of graduate studies. "They're coming from the whole world, and they're not all 22 years old," Dr. Sullivan said.
"We have people of all ages and all backgrounds." UT also asked graduate school applicants this year to list the highest level of education attained by their parents. The college then divided applicants into groups based on their answers, concluding that students whose parents had less education fell into the low-income bracket.
"Everybody is interested in doing this in good faith, but sometimes, they're a little bit mystified about exactly what to do," Dr. Sullivan said. It's unclear what effect the new law will bring. Michael Duran, president of the Chicano/Hispanic Law Students' Association at UT's law school, predicted it will make a difference.
The law school already allowed students to write essays about whether they had economic, social or personal disadvantages in their life, he said. "The bill gives more credence to that," Mr. Duran said.
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