Special admits

Assuming that UCLA does have a stricter policy against admitting students with lower academic standards, what's the policy impulse behind that standard? Is there a stated policy reason?

It just seems that allowing for 'special admits,' provides an opportunity for student athletes with lower academic stats to become enriched by a good academic environment. If it's a character thing I understand, but if it's just that they had struggled with academics in the past, why not help them benefit from the good academics at UCLA?

Does anyone know the policy reasons behind UCLA's supposed higher academic standards?

This is interesting stuff. Just a guess, but I think the administration probably feels like admitting students that don't meet the academic standards brings down the reputation of the university as a whole. UCLA isn't a school just anyone can breeze through. If they admit kids who can't cut it in the classroom, how do they make sure they stay academically eligible for football (without cheating or fudging grades)?

Just a guess: UCLA is an institution of higher learning. Just because some universities may engage in wholesale prositution of their standards to get goob ballplayers, doesn't mean it is appropriate. A small number of exceptions is acceptable and justifiable. But, blanket admission of unqualified atheletes diminishes the reputation of a program and cuts at the integrity of the educational mssion of the universities.

(There! A UB post without vituperative content.)

What I find verrrry interesting is the list of schools that report zero special admits. For example, Michigan. It's a traditional football powerhouse, and it's consistently tied for ~24th with UCLA in the US News & World Report university rankings.

@ mindshed

I was thinking the exact same thing. At least with THE Ohio State University*, their academic standards are so low they don't have to give "special admittance," but Michigan and UNC? (Not that UNC is terribly competitive in football, but somehow everyone on the team meets admission standards?) De omnibus dubitandum...

* Sorry - low blow to OSU - but I have too many friends that went there who make college football season an endless stream of phone calls and emails talking trash about UCLA's lack of a program.

@ mindshed

I was thinking the exact same thing. At least with THE Ohio State University*, their academic standards are so low they don't have to give "special admittance," but Michigan and UNC? (Not that UNC is terribly competitive in football, but somehow everyone on the team meets admission standards?) De omnibus dubitandum...

* Sorry - low blow to OSU - but I have too many friends that went there who make college football season an endless stream of phone calls and emails talking trash about UCLA's lack of a program.

mindshed - I was thinking the exact same thing. At least with THE Ohio State University*, their academic standards are so low they don't have to give "special admittance," but Michigan and UNC? (Not that UNC is terribly competitive in football, but somehow everyone on the team meets admission standards?) De omnibus dubitandum...

* Sorry - low blow to OSU - but I have too many friends that went there who make college football season an endless stream of phone calls and emails talking trash about UCLA's lack of a program.

@ mindshed

I was thinking the exact same thing. At least with THE Ohio State University, their academic standards are so low they don't have to give "special admittance," but Michigan and UNC? (Not that UNC is terribly competitive in football, but somehow everyone on the team meets admission standards?) De omnibus dubitandum...

Sorry - low blow to OSU - but I have too many friends that went there who make college football season an endless stream of phone calls and emails talking trash about UCLA's lack of a program.

Jeff....I don't think there is a stated criteria for admittance of those who don't qualify with grades. It is random.

Every school has a "committee" that allows for special admittance. If Harvard wants a "C" student who is a great skuller, their "committee" will get him in. It is the same committee that gets a major billionaire donor's stupid daughter into the school,,,or a hired coach's son. So if UCLA's committee wants to be stricter they'll be stricter and are not governed by the same rules that Berkley might go with.

I believe the gpa for admittance into UCLA is 3.7something. However UCLA has the largest # of applicants in the USA. THAT will raise the bell curve for gpa standards. A friend of mine who used to work in admin said you really need a 4.something to get in because many many of those applicants carry a 4+ gpa.

A couple of years ago the ncaa said they were going to monitor more closely at abuses to these "special admittances". I'll look for the article.

As for Michigan,,,are they saying in effect that ALL their athletes qualify academically for UM's admittance? Then it must be pretty low.

apparently, gubon was thinking the exact same thing...

This has nothing to do with UCLA's academic reputation. A few FB players aren't going to diminish our Academic Reputation. What it has to do with is very simple, in the past, specifically under Bob Toledo and Terry Donahue, UCLA allowed more special admits or minimum qualifiers. This lowered UCLA's progress score and the administration was not happy with this. When I went to UCLA during the early to mid 90's, I personally knew several ball players on the team who were gone within 2-3 years and not just from the team, but gone from the school. They got to UCLA, were overwhelmed, didn't take academics seriously, and pretty much just partied all the time. This use to happen ALL the time. In order to lower this occurence, the administration decided to raise the standards. The results are apparent, we now have many more athletes who have graduated or stayed academically eligible. Seriously, when was the last time you heard of a FB or BB player being suspended becasuse of a lack of acceptable academic progress these days? Doesn't happen nearly as often as it did. Like Brian Dohn has said many times, if the special situation guys happen to do better academically, then the administration will capitulate and allow more of these special admits. What we need to decide is whether or not we want to compromise our standards for wins. I would like to see a friendlier balance in this regard. We must also understand that, typically, bad students are also bad character individuals. Just look at the Toledo years.

Very insightful BF. Thanks for sharing your perspective...

just have to note that i am thoroughly enjoying the level of intelligence in these comments, short of gubon's multiple posts, but he made fun of ohio state so i'll give him a pass.

This is now the culture at UCLA that has punished Karl Dorrell and perhaps Rick Neuheisel for the sins of Donahue, Toledo and to a certain extent Jim Harrick. Because they allowed in athletes that had no business being at any 4-year college much less UCLA, the by-product of this is a stricter policy that is letting fewer borderline "students" to be admitted to Westwood. With any luck at all, the scales are beginning to tip in favor of bringing in more special admits for Neuheisel since Dorrell and Ben Howland made every attempt to bring in more studious individuals to the athletic program.

Miltk,

You're wrong. The average GPA for A STUDENT to get into UCLA might be a 3.7, but that is just the average, not the minimum qualification. Actaully I believe the average GPA of a UCLA enrollee and admittee is over 4.0 now. However, that is NOT the minimum GPA to qualify to get into UCLA. The minimum GPA to qualify to get into UCLA is the same as all other UC schools and it is based on a sliding scale with an opposite correlation between GPA and ACT or SAT score. Meaning, the lower GPA you have, the higher ACT or SAT score you must have and vice versa. However, this is only the minimum, meaning, that at schools like UCLA and Cal, the standard to get in will be much HIGHER than the minimum because of the level of comepetition and the quality of the applicants. Meaning, just like a company may have minimum experience standards to apply for the position, the position will obviously go to the most qualified applicant. However, these are the typical standards for UCLA students, not Student Athletes. Student Athletes have minimum standards to adhere to by different organizations, which are typically lower than for your average student applicant. The NCAA has a minimum, which everybody must at least follow and which is the lowest of all standards. Then, conferences, such as the Pac-10 have their own Student Athlete minimums as does the UC system, all these standards are MINIMUM standards, eac individual school still has the right to raise their own minimums to what EVER level they choose. UCLA and Stanford happen to have chosen to have the HIGHEST minimum student athlete standards of all Pac-10 schools. CAPICHE?

I miss the 90s...

gf,,,i dunno, but didn't i just say that??? :):) maybe not with the depth you posted, but that's what i said. except my friend said it's now 4.2.

bruinfaithful,

you seem very knowledgeable on the subject or you can stretch your average knowledge over 200 words, not sure which yet. but while you described the standard admissions policy in that last post, i missed any reference of special admits in there. where do they fit in?

CAL suckz! UCLA is the real deal and where its at yo, they all know it but wont ever admit it.

i wish ucla would lower its academic standards for atheletes. i see it happening in the future...

I'm with you bb06.

I've always felt admin was high falootin' about UCLA's academics, and that has carried over to their treatment of sports. However the lower standards have not affected Berkley's standing in the academic community last time I checked.