New system to help U-M make admissions picks, maintain diversity

Colleges & Universities A-Z University of Michigan
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<p>
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The University of Michigan is using a new system provided by the College Board to help it choose among its 27,000 applicants this year.</p>

<p>Called Descriptor Plus, the online system uses geo-demography to help paint a picture of prospective students' backgrounds and potential to succeed at U-M.Ted Spencer, associate vice provost and executive director of the Office of Undergraduate Admissions, said the system has helped the university get a more holistic view of its applicants, and a new paperless system has allowed for a quicker review.</p>

<p>And it also will help the school achieve its goal of maintaining diversity without violating Proposal 2, the statewide constitutional amendment approved by voters in November eliminates the use of race and gender preferences in admissions decisions...</p>

<p>Chris Lucier, director of recruitment and operations, said that U-M is one of about 40 schools across the country that use Descriptor Plus as a tool in the admissions process.</p>

<p>"It's truly putting together many pieces of a puzzle to put together a picture of the student," he said.</p>

<p>He added that of the 10,300 students admitted so far for the 2006-2007 freshman year, half had grade-point averages of 3.7-4.0; ACT scores between 27 and 31; and SAT scores from 1260 to 1480. One-quarter of the students' scores and grades are below those levels, and one-quarter are above them.</p>

<p>However, Lucier said, "There are 4.0 students who probably will not be admitted to the University of Michigan. Why? Because there are students with a 3.6 who chose to take "a more challenging academic course load."

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<p><a href="http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070328/NEWS06/70328034&imw=Y%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070328/NEWS06/70328034&imw=Y&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

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<p>I don't have last year's numbers, but the two years before Michigan took around 13,000 students. So it looks like there are around 3,000 more students that will be admitted.</p>

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<p>Nope, nowhere near 3000 more will be admitted.</p>

<p>Last year they admitted less than 12,000 for the Fall term.</p>

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<p>Only about 2,000 left. Maybe less. Ok Thanks.</p>

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<p>This update article fills in a few more details on the new wrinkles in UM's holistic admissions process:</p>

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[quote]
University officials said Wednesday that they have received a record 27,000 applications from students seeking admission to Michigan next fall. They expect that number to be the largest among Big Ten schools for incoming freshmen.</p>

<p>Roughly 5,500 students are expected in the next freshmen class, although a few thousand more than that will gain admission but decide to go elsewhere or fail to take other steps needed for enrollment.</p>

<p>The admissions process won't be complete for several more weeks. University officials said at a media briefing Wednesday that the admissions process is still thorough, holistic and multifaceted while remaining very selective and competitive.</p>

<p>"We make no bones about the fact diversity is important to us," said Ted Spencer, an associate vice provost for the Ann Arbor school. "It always has been at the University of Michigan."...</p>

<p>Students' files are reviewed at least twice. Some get a third review, and the toughest cases often are settled by a committee.</p>

<p>Student applications include standardized test scores, transcripts of class records, essays and letters of recommendation.</p>

<p>In using Descriptor PLUS, is a database service from The College Board, university officials also have access to an analysis that breaks down students into clusters based on their high schools and their neighborhoods.</p>

<p>The University of Michigan pays $15,000 a year for the service, which is new for this admissions cycle but was adopted before voters passed Proposal 2 in November.</p>

<p>Michigan students typically have grade-point averages of at least 3.7, but other factors - some of which can be brought out through the new database program or in essays and letters of recommendation - influence whether a student is admitted.</p>

<p>At Wednesday's briefing, university officials used as an example a white male student with a 3.1 grade-point average who has taken fairly tough classes. The student finished high in his class, is considered a school leader, is heavily involved in extracurricular activities and worked on a farm to help his family pay the bills.</p>

<p>His evaluation summary noted parents' estimated income and educational level, race and gender, citizenship and other factors. Evaluators noted that the university probably doesn't get many applicants from the student's high school and that he lived in a high-interest, underrepresented neighborhood.</p>

<p>The student has been offered admission, university officials said.</p>

<p>"We want more kids from those types of schools that have done these types of things," Spencer said.

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<p><a href="http://www.lsj.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070329/NEWS01/703290327/1001/opinion%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.lsj.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070329/NEWS01/703290327/1001/opinion&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

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<p>Jeez, Michigan's only admitted about 37% of applicants so far, and the application process should be done soon.</p>

<p>It's gotten a whole lot more competetive lately.</p>

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<p>asteriskea, thanks for your posts. Informative.</p>

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<p>WaleedF: Where did you get the "37%" from?</p>

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<p>geese.. just give me the decision already;</p>

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<p>This sounds like a promising answer post-affirmative action.</p>

<p>As more schools take into account socio-economic factors in the admission process, we might be able to start leveling the playing field.</p>

<p>Kudos to Michigan</p>

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<p>According to a list provided by the College Board, forty-one other colleges - primarily private schools - currently use Descriptor Plus. Michigan State University and Northwestern University are the only other Big Ten schools using it. While some universities (Brandeis, for example) currently use Descriptor Plus to target and recruit prospective students deemed most likely to apply and accept offers to attend, the U-M decided the program would be best used as part of its admissions process:</p>

<p>
[quote]
Students from underprivileged neighborhoods and high schools will get a boost in the admissions process now that the University is using a new demographics service offered by the College Board.</p>

<p>The service, called Descriptor Plus, sorts students into "neighborhood clusters" and "high school clusters." It provides the University with demographic information about the socioeconomic, educational and racial breakdown of the applicant's neighborhood or high school - information that University officials say will help them select diverse freshman classes without considering race.</p>

<p>The University's undergraduate admissions office began using the service at the beginning of the current admissions cycle in September.</p>

<p>University officials said they hope the service will help the University maintain ethnic diversity after the passage of Proposal 2, which banned the use of affirmative action.</p>

<p>But Proposal 2 wasn't the reason for the implementation of the system, said Chris Lucier, director of recruitment and operations for the University's undergraduate admissions office.</p>

<p>"It's not a device that's oriented solely at social or ethnic diversity," Lucier said. "It's another tool for us to identify populations that might not have the same access to higher education as other populations."</p>

<p>But Lucier said Descriptor Plus is legal under Proposal 2 because it's based on geographic and educational information - the consideration of which Proposal 2 didn't outlaw. Admissions officers and the College Board don't use ethnic information when grouping students into clusters.</p>

<p>He said Descriptor Plus is one of many factors taken into account when considering applications.</p>

<p>Using demographic characteristics like annual income, ethnic breakdown and college attendance, Descriptor Plus groups neighborhoods into one of 30 "Educational Neighborhood Clusters." It also forms "High School Clusters" by measuring factors that show a school's academic quality and its students' racial and socioeconomic backgrounds.</p>

<p>Alan Foutz, an attorney for The Pacific Legal Foundation, a California-based law firm that opposes affirmative action, said it would be hard to challenge the University's use of Descriptor Plus in court.</p>

<p>"They would have to establish that the criteria they are using are subterfuge for actual racial profiling, which would be a difficult case to establish," he said. "If they are in fact taking into consideration the whole panoply of demographics that are attached to a particular geographic area, that is most likely not a violation of Michigan's Proposal 2."</p>

<p>The number of students at the University from each cluster varies dramatically. Five of the 30 neighborhood clusters produced about three quarters of the students that make up the University's class of 2008 and class of 2009, according to data from the Office of Undergraduate Admissions.</p>

<p>These five clusters range from middle-class to very affluent. About 90 percent of students in each of the five groups are white.</p>

<p>Ted Spencer, executive director of the University's undergraduate admissions office, said the University hopes Descriptor Plus will prevent the sharp drop in minority attendance that was seen at the University of Texas and the University of California system after their states banned the use of affirmative action...

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<p><a href="http://media.www.michigandaily.com/media/storage/paper851/news/2007/03/29/HigherEducation/u.Gauges.Geographic.Diversity-2811811.shtml%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://media.www.michigandaily.com/media/storage/paper851/news/2007/03/29/HigherEducation/u.Gauges.Geographic.Diversity-2811811.shtml&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

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<p>Brilliant. Let's not use race, rather let's stereotype our applicants.</p>

<p>It will never change.</p>

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<p>But they are using race:
[quote]
The service, called Descriptor Plus, sorts students into "neighborhood clusters" and "high school clusters." It provides the University with demographic information about the socioeconomic, educational and racial breakdown of the applicant's neighborhood or high school - information that University officials say will help them select diverse freshman classes without considering race.

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<p>This is just sad.</p>

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<p>Just how and why is this sad and is it stereotyping applicants? Universities do have diversity goals and the articles quoted above contain several statements made by University of Michigan reps. that make that perfectly clear.
[quote]
Ted Spencer, executive director of the University's undergraduate admissions office, said the University hopes Descriptor Plus will prevent the sharp drop in minority attendance that was seen at the University of Texas and the University of California system after their states banned the use of affirmative action...

[/quote]
Of course race and ethnicity are factors that are taken into account to build a class. But as long as race and ethnicity are not the key factors used to identify prospective candidates, determine or make admissions decisions, or even to design admissions models, they process is considered to be race neutral. Successful admission models must allow higher ed administrators to meet diversity goals (male-female balance, geographic distribution, socioeconomic levels, academic and EC interests, as well as race) and, at the same time, withstand legal scrutiny over time. Colleges and universities do have a bottom line and a mission and it follows that they must meet institutional goals - and racial and ethnic diversity must be just a part of the whole. The U-M's use of the CB's Descriptor Plus directly in the admissions process is a both a cost-efficient and rather astute path to find an admissions model geared to maximize HE goals and minimize legal risk.</p>

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<p>I can't tell. Is the article accusing UM admissions of using this new approach in order to subvert the voter mandate?</p>

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<p>My answer to that is to uphold it in a way that fulfills U-M's mission and diversity goals.</p>

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<p>EXACTLY right. How can you not take race and ethnicity as a factor at all when you make a class. Not considering that factor at some level is stupid. Race and ethnicity are a VERY IMPORTANT part of someones life, and it one of the main ways people look at them in the outside world. To not take that as a factor at all is not taking into consideration how someone has grown up and what they have had to deal with their whole life. It is basically ignoring a whole chunk of what makes a person up. *If part of the college admission process is finding out how a person is as a whole then those factors have to be taken into account somewhere. *</p>

<p>While AA might have been to severe for some I feel this in not severe at all and is a definite step in the right direction. This system does not give a boost to anyone it just takes factors of who a person is more into account so that they can create a diverse student body. No matter how many of you people in the suburbs think that everything is fair and the same everywhere this is NOT TRUE, this system takes that into account, and thus it should be praised, not knocked on. Will any of you pro-segregation people ever be happy.</p>

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<p>so is this good for other races than white guys?</p>

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<p>In this case the whole students background was taken into account. Socioeconomic factors, where he went to school, race, gender, and other things. The reason why this isn't against proposal 2 is because their was no predetermined boost given to this student. He got into the school despite having very low scores compared to the average of the school, because of his background. Upon finding more about him they realized that he would still have a good chance of succeeding at the school. This system seems to be a lot better at taking a holistic view of a person.</p>