Thursday, October 29, 1998
Faculty walkout reveals UC’s undemocratic governing system
SUPPORT: Rallies for affirmative action bare Regents’ political
agenda
By Graciela Liz Geyer
The University of California admissions criteria were not
"brought down from the mountain on stone tablets," they were
written by people in power, said Professor Sandra Hale, of the
women’s studies and anthropology departments. Hale summed up many
reasons why the faculty decided to organize around the issue of
eliminating affirmative action in university hiring and admissions
at the faculty rally on Oct. 21.
She brought up the decision-making process of the UCs as well as
the validity and justification of the Regents for ignoring the need
to consider race and gender in admissions.
On Oct. 21 and 22, Faculty Responsible for Educational Equity
(FREE), including professors and instructors from all over the
University of California, in collaboration with students, held
demonstrations, marches, rallies and teach-ins in a system-wide
walkout. Although students from UC Davis to UC San Diego have been
collectively organizing since the spring around the drop in numbers
of people of color, the system-wide action by faculty marks a
critical point in the struggle to regain consideration of race and
gender in admissions.
Admissions decisions are made by individuals, not gods, and as
such we have the full ability to critique and evaluate them based
on whether or not they meet with University of California goals,
and with the purpose of higher education and public education as a
whole. During the walkout, several examples pointed out where
research has shown a bias, with regards to race and income, by
primarily using GPA and SAT scores to evaluate the students
applying to the university.
Recent studies show that underrepresented students who graduate
from affirmative action programs are substantially more likely to
go into public service and work in low-income areas and communities
of color vs. private sector and corporate jobs; they are the very
underrepresented students that SP-1 and Proposition 209 have
excluded from the UCs.
The mission of the UC is to serve all sectors of California with
education and research; this goal is not being met by the
elimination of affirmative action. If we are using criteria that
perpetuates race and class divisions, can we truly argue that
university admission is not biased and serves the entire state of
California equally?
This is what is meant by "institutionalized" racism, sexism and
classism. It is the system itself that discriminates.
That the faculty spoke out against the elimination of
affirmative action is no surprise, considering their immediate
opposition to the Regents’ decision in July of 1995. The UC
administration, embodied in the Regents, purports to run the
university under a system of "shared governance," intended to lead
people to believe that the university is insulated from the
instability of "political" whims; the UCs are supposed to be run by
impartial experts on education whose interest it is to serve the
people of California. But the general policy of allowing the
faculty to make decisions regarding admissions and faculty
selection was ignored by passing SP-1 and SP-2; and so the Regents,
prompted by the governor, went ahead and made SP-1 and SP-2
law.
The selection and background of the Regents is of much interest
here. Out of 26 Regents, 18 are appointed by the governor for
12-year terms, three are faculty of two-year terms, two are alumni
of two-year terms, and only one is a student of a one-year term.
The decision to eliminate affirmative action from the University
was a 14-10-1 vote in favor of SP-1.
Furthermore, the Regents whom the governor appoints do not have
to meet any criteria or have any experience in education or
administration, yet they can override a decision made by the
faculty, nine chancellors and staff, and they do they not have to
consider the students in their decision making.
Even the UC president at the time opposed SP-1. In fact, the
governor’s Regents by and large are political appointments, and are
quite often big campaign contributors  one is the wife of
Gov. Pete Wilson’s former campaign manager.
Last week, the Undergraduate Student Association Council (USAC)
passed a resolution supporting the faculty walkout system-wide,
encouraging students to learn more about the issue itself and the
particulars of eliminating affirmative action at the UCs.
Besides the students’ strong support of affirmative action
across the state, this walkout is also about the undemocratic
governance of the university and the mission of the the
institution.
Can 14 people override a consensus among all parts of the
university? They can override it at the University of California.
This is stated in the resolution passed by USAC: "Whereas, the UC
Regents passed proposals SP-1 and SP-2 to eliminate the
consideration of race and gender in July of 1995, defying the UC’s
policy of Shared Governance by ignoring the opposition voiced by
the Academic Senate, all nine chancellors of the UC, staff
associations and constant opposition from students," we stand in
solidarity with FREE to organize a long-term campaign for equality
and social justice.
The manner in which Proposition 209 was framed and discussed was
a misrepresentation.
Polls across the United States show broad support for
affirmative action programs. When a poll was taken as to whether
the initiative would pass with language that stated the elimination
of "affirmative action" it was overwhelmingly opposed; but
Proposition 209 did not even mention "affirmative action." The
title alone, the California Civil Rights Initiative, as one
professor pointed out, was a malicious misrepresentation designed
to distort and cloud the consequences of implementing such a
law.
Instead of educating the state on the effects of Proposition
209’s passage, the administration of each campus (which at the time
of SP-1 and SP-2 was vocally against the measure) has either
remained silent or been replaced by yes-men who perpetuate the idea
that we can be proud of the "excellence" of the incoming classes
under Proposition 209; using GPA and SAT scores as the only means
of measuring that "excellence."
We need the faculty even more because of the unmitigated lack of
intelligent and critical discussion or education by the
administration on affirmative action and the myriad issues tied to
this.
A campus implementing such a policy is negligent if it doesn’t
know affirmative action’s myths  that the policy is an
attempt to temper the racist and sexist rhetoric that has
exponentially increased on campus.
That SP-1 was a political move is of no question. Initiative
2000, a carbon-copy of Proposition 209, is up for consideration in
Washington state, whose population is only 11 percent people of
color, and Regent Ward Connerly is currently campaigning there for
it.
We have already witnessed the effects in California, which has
such large numbers of underrepresented communities in comparison;
no doubt Initiative 2000 would devastate such a small population.
It is no wonder that Washington was chosen as a target state. But
it is not the only case; the passage of Proposition 209 in
California has sparked similar university policies, initiatives and
laws across the country.
We must denounce the Regents’ decision, and the continual
misrepresentation of affirmative action, as wrong and cancerous to
the well-being of our society. Today, under SP-1 and Proposition
209, African American students are at lower numbers since the
university has recognized racial categories. Regent Connerly had
even at one point proposed to eliminate the categories, thereby
removing any means of knowing if the student population reflected
the state at all. Whereas a university is supposed to gather the
information, Regent Connerly proposed to erase it.
We all have opinions on the issue, or maybe we have none at all,
but what is painfully clear is that we are not intended to know
about it, discuss it or teach it.
In the face of that, we must challenge assumptions that
attribute failure to the people instead of criticizing the
system.
There is much to learn about affirmative action and the reasons
why race, ethnicity, class and gender continue to shape our lives,
limit our options, and grant us privilege over others.
Whatever our perspective, we must always remember we are at a
public university to learn about and understand our world and
hopefully to improve it.
Comments, feedback, problems?
© 1998 ASUCLA Communications Board[Home]