<p>^^Definitely agree with the whole “UC admissions is a crapshoot”. I know people that get rejected from schools like UCSB, UCSD, and UCD, but they get into Berkeley and UCLA. And very often there are cases of people getting rejected from UCLA but accepted to Berkeley.</p>
<p>Also, from an objective point of view, I have to say affirmative action (based on race) is a horrible idea. Should there be affirmative action? Maybe, but if there is, it should be based on income level/financial status, not racial background.</p>
<p>I also don’t see why conspiracy theorists say UCLA does affirmative action. It should be obvious that that isn’t the case. If there was affirmative action, half the school wouldn’t be Asian, and more than 2% of the students would be African-American.</p>
<p>the politically correct answer is that UC’s do not practice affirmative action but…here’s an interesting article from 2 years ago about holistic admissions:</p>
<p>Arguing that UCLA admissions policies are being manipulated to circumvent the state’s ban on consideration of applicants’ race, a professor there has resigned from a faculty committee that he says refused to allow him to study the matter.</p>
<p>Political science professor Tim Groseclose resigned Thursday from the Committee on Undergraduate Admissions and Relations with Schools, saying high-ranking university administrators and fellow committee members are engaged in a “coverup” to block illegal activity from being discovered.</p>
<p>“A growing body of evidence strongly suggests that UCLA is cheating on admissions,” he wrote in an 89-page report posted on a UCLA website.</p>
<hr>
<p>IMO its not a coincidence that the number of URM have increased since the holistic admissions has been introduced. (not arguing if its a good/bad thing). While it would be better if they could do affirmative action on income/financial status, it would be even more subjective/harder to regulate</p>
<p>There’s no doubt in my mind that they engage in affirmative action to at least some extent. Many of my friends from my floor last year are hispanic, and the vast majority of them had stats that were below average.
However, UCLA is nowhere near as bad as Stanford. I know someone who was wait listed there who is at the low end of even UCLA.</p>
<p>Holistic admissions allows them to favor people that grew up in disadvantaged areas, and they often happen to be hispanic. That doesn’t mean they directly practice affirmative action.</p>
i heard about that. However, i believe that UCLA attributed the increase in hispanic students to more heavy recruiting. I believe i read it on the daily bruin, but don’t feel like looking for the article ATM.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Hispanic enrollment rates are up to their highest ever right now</p>
<p>although the study does admit that nearly 50% of these students are in community colleges. I think the percentage of hispanic/black students at UCLA was still much higher pre-prop 209, however they graduated at a lower rate.</p>
<p>While there’s no doubting that holistic admissions benefit hispanic students, i would imagine that they also benefit student’s who had one of their parents die abruptly, and then had to get jobs to support their families, which affected their grades. Nobody has a perfect life, but some people have a much easier time than others, and i think that’s ultimately the purpose of holistic admissions is to reflect that.</p>