Thursday, November 19, 1998
Upholding diversity UC’s responsibility
REGENTS: Decisions on affirmative action affect quality student
education
By Stacy H. Lee and Mike de la Rocha
In its practices and policies, the California public higher
education system, including the University of California (UC)
schools, reflects the inequities present within our society as a
whole. UC schools are supposed to be free, yet students pay
thousands of dollars each year for a long list of fees. Women are
supposed to have equal rights, yet they still receive substantially
lower wages than men. All people are supposed to be treated as
equals under the law, yet some domestic partnership benefits (legal
rights and benefits for same-sex couples) are continuously
denied.
Are you starting to get the picture?
Well, that the UC Regents, our governing body, are making
decisions based on political connections rather than serving the
public’s needs should not surprise you.
UC Regent Ward Connerly has said, "I will resign if Gray Davis
wins!"
Connerly and others illustrate how the UC Regents are not making
educational decisions based on our interests, but rather to further
political ambitions and agendas. This can be seen by the fact that
former Gov. Pete Wilson used SP-1 and SP-2, policies which
eliminated race and gender for consideration in admissions and
hiring in the UC system, as the backbone for his unsuccessful
presidential campaign. Even more disconcerting is that Connerly
himself is the state fundraising coordinator for the Republican
Party. Can we then believe that the Board of Regents base their
decisions as an autonomous body that’s free from political
influences as mandated by our State Constitution?
Now, what consequences do the Regents’ decisions have for us as
UCLA students? Not only have the Regents raised our registration
fees by 135 percent in the last seven years, but the appointment of
Chancellor Carnesale and his actions thus far raise some serious
concerns. Carnesale, like Ward Connerly, was approved by Pete
Wilson and hired by the rest of the UC Regents to uphold a
particular political agenda.
From his excessive use of the Los Angeles Police Department Riot
Squad last year in dealing with nonviolent student protests to his
numerous contradictory quotes, Carnesale has shown and even stated
that one of the main reasons why he was hired was to uphold the
misleading Proposition 209.
After seven months of various protests involving thousands of
UCLA students and community members, Chancellor Carnesale finally
admitted in the Daily Bruin last week that "diversity is on the
wane" – what we would call an educational crisis. Later in the same
article he states that "meaningful results (i.e. more students of
color) will take years to achieve."
But what should we expect to happen in the 10 or more years
needed to achieve "meaningful results?" Basically, it’s clear that
Chancellor Carnesale does not see the need to ensure that African
Americans, Chicana/os, Latina/os, Native Americans and women will
have access to UCLA, at least not in our generation.
Chancellor Carnesale as well as the UC Office of the President
(referred to as UCOP … hmm) continue to assert that our
universities’ "excellence" and "standards" will be upheld, many
people are being left behind, leaving us to recall the days of Jim
Crow policies which devastated black people’s rights. By using
standards and guidelines that effectively excluded African
Americans from institutions, white supremacist ideals were
maintained "within the means of the law." By stating that his
"outreach" plans are the only mechanism to increase diversity on
this campus, Chancellor Carnesale is not searching deep enough into
the roots of exclusion from higher education.
The SAT, GPA and other "standards of excellence" have been
proven time and time again to be biased against gender, race and
class. Therefore, the SAT and individual GPAs should be viewed as
biased in the favor of those who have the privilege to "excel" in
those arenas. How does this measure of "quality" evoke any sense of
equality? It doesn’t – and that is exactly the problem.
Recently, many people have breathed a sigh of relief with the
election of Gray Davis, the first Democratic governor in almost two
decades. But we must continue to realize that change will not
simply come with this shift in political office. Change has
historically come from mass movements involving community, labor
and students such as ourselves. It was only through student and
community protests that the ethnic and gender studies centers were
created in the 1960s and a five percent fee rollback in 1998 were
made possible. While we do have a new governor in office we must
not forget to hold Davis and Chancellor Carnesale accountable for
making education accessible to all.
We must demand that Davis appoint student education-friendly
regents and pressure Connerly to follow through on his threat to
resign. We must also demand that Chancellor Carnesale push his
administration and the Academic Senate to remove barriers to
education that are present in the current admissions criteria.
Today, we can continue on with this struggle by participating in
various events which will be sponsored by the Affirmative Action
Coalition. Starting at 10:30 a.m., students will be meeting at
Meyerhoff Park (in front of Kerckhoff Hall) to pass out educational
literature. An educational picket will follow at noon in front of
Covel Commons, the site of the notorious UC Regents meeting.
Afterwards, there will be a roundtable discussion on affirmative
action which will be held at the Rieber Fireside Lounge from 6 p.m.
to 9 p.m.
This will be an opportunity for students to converse with UCLA
faculty, community members and labor activists on how the loss of
affirmative action has affected everything from the work force to
the decline in educational "quality" that UCLA can provide.
Students should attend these events to continue on with the
activism needed to truly transform the purpose and face of this
campus from its current oppressive form to one that reflects our
vision of equality.
Comments, feedback, problems?
© 1998 ASUCLA Communications Board[Home]