Minority enrollment escalates
Due to enhanced recruiting efforts, there was a significant increase in the number of black students who enrolled at Rice in 1995. The number jumped from 28 students in 1994 to 64 in 1995, an increase of 127.2 percent. Blacks now make up 10 percent of the freshman class rather than 4.4 percent like in the previous year. According to The Journal of Blacks in Higher Education , Rice had the highest percentage increase in black enrollment between 1994 and 1995 compared to the other top-25 universities listed in the U.S. News and World Report .
The increase in enrollment coincides with an increase in the number of black, Hispanic and Native American applicants last year and in the number of offers of admission made to these applicants.
Dean of Admission Richard Stabell said, "We concentrated on increasing the numbers [because] the year before we had a disappointingly small number of minority students, specifically blacks."
Stabell said, "[Admission] visited schools which had a high minority population, we did a larger direct mail program, and we inaugurated the special recruiting program called Vision." He said more black athletes were also accepted, and Rice's financial aid program and new black alumni organization in Houston attracted many students.
The Office of Admission hopes to continue to improve minority recruitment. As part of this effort this year, Tamara Siler was chosen to fill the newly created position of coordinator of minority recruitment.
Director of Admission Julie Browning said she hopes that the numbers will continue to increase although she thinks Rice is getting close to providing an "experience that is reflective of the world students go to."
Both Stabell and Browning insist that under- represented minorities are treated the same way as other applicants in the admissions process. "It seems to me [that] affirmative action, at least from a quota point of view, doesn't exist in a sense that there are protected categories in the applicant pool. On the other hand, if seeking diversity is affirmative action, yes we practice affirmative action," Stabell said.
With all applicants, the Office of Admission looks for people who have valuable qualities to offer Rice and takes special consideration of the obstacles they have had to face. A student's ability to overcome obstacles in the past usually indicates that he or she will handle the rigors of college successfully.
Browning said minorities more often have to deal with obstacles like biased standardized tests, poorly funded high schools and a lack of incentive from family and community to attend college. She points to high retention rates of minorities as a sign that they have been making good decisions. She is further substantiated by small differences in the grade point averages of minority and non-minority students, which is usually around half a grade point.
These considerations, however, cause a significant difference in the admissions statistics for underre- presented minorities. The average SAT score of black and Hispanic nonathletes in recent years has been about 180 points lower than that of the nonathlete freshman class as a whole. The acceptance rate for these minorities is between 45 and 50 percent compared to an overall acceptance rate of about 26 percent for 1995. The quality of the academic record of these students, however, is no different from that of the rest of the class.
Stabell said the Office of Admission has "no formula that says everyone's admitted who fits this criteria." He said a strong academic record is often more important than SAT scores. He also pointed out that the underrepresented minority acceptance rate is comparable to the acceptance rate of alumni children and smaller than that of faculty and staff dependents.
Harry White, a senior at Will Rice College, expressed some common concerns about affirmative action in admissions. He said he is against affirmative action although he supports diversity "when it doesn't weaken the class." He described affirmative action in admissions as a "detriment" to minorities because it creates "doubt in other people's minds as to their true ability ... instead of creating a more united society, it leads to balkanization in the society."
Chandler Davidson, the chair of the Sociology Department and the Committee on Admission, addressed this issue. "My own perception as a white person is that the worry that critics of affirmative action have about the alleged feeling of unworthiness on the part of black students is seriously overblown, but I suppose that's a question that black people themselves are in better position to answer than white people are," he said.
Rod Sanders, a black and Mexican American student who is a freshman at Brown College, said that he has never encountered any bitterness or resentment from white students at Rice.
"I don't feel underconfident about whether or not I should be at Rice. It has never been a huge issue for me," Sanders said.
Sanders said he is ambivalent about affirmative action because he thinks "people should be judged on merit." However, he admits that, "things aren't completely even yet" and "certain provisions have to be made until there is complete and even parity." He also thinks it is necessary to "preserve a sense of diversity because that's part of the entire college experience."
White also argued that "if there is going to be affirmative action, it should be based on economic grounds and not racial grounds." Davidson said that Rice already considers low socio-economic status as a factor to be overcome. If Rice focused on economic status rather than race, he said the "number of minority students accepted at Rice would plummet" because there are more disadvantaged white people than minorities.
Browning said, "Our goal simply is that we bring a diverse, highly qualified class to Rice." She encourages discussion and debate among staff members in order to discover "the best way to be affirmative."
This item appeared in the News section of the March 22, 1996 issue.
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