<p>Reported in today's Chronicle of Higher Ed:</p>
<p>
[quote]
The Texas Senate voted today to limit a controversial policy that requires public universities to admit Texas students who graduate in the top 10 percent of their high-school classes.</p>
<p>The bill, which is scheduled for a final Senate vote on Wednesday before moving on to the State House of Representatives, would allow universities to cap the number of students admitted under the policy at 60 percent of their freshman class. According to reports in the Austin American-Statesman and The Dallas Morning News, top 10-percenters filled 81 percent of the freshman seats at the University of Texas flagship campus at Austin this year, and officials said that proportion could rise to 86 percent next year and 100 percent within four years.
<p>I e-mailed my senator and representative last week about this and received a response from my senator today…it look like it will pass in the Senate but it is in the House that it usually stalls… this has been presented many times however it is a little different this time…we’ll see.</p>
<p>Interesting. As a non-Texan I don’t proclaim a great deal of knowledge about this law, but it seems to me that it should be written in such a way to equalize districts either through a formulaic combination of ACT or SAT scores, GPA and class rank with minimum thresholds to be fair. It sounds to an outsider as if the law says the top 10% of every school would be granted admittance which seems quite odd and does not put everyone on equal footing. If you were in a highly competitive public school that top 10% would be incredibly limiting I think. In our kids small public school, not in Texas, the top 20 - 25% of the students are very tightly grouped.</p>
<p>mom…you hit the nail on the head…that’s exactly why the top 10% rule doesn’t work…the top 10% of “any” school in Texas is admitted…it doesn’t matter if it is a highly competitive school in the suburbs or a very small rural school in what we in Texas call “podunk”…the other kicker is that most of the kids in the top 10% just take the SAT or ACT one time because they have to submit a score but it doesn’t matter what that score is as long as they are in the top 10%. A Texas student that is not in the top 10% but has a 2400 SAT would not be automatically admitted…there is something very wrong with this and I hope that it passes for the greater good of higher education in Texas.</p>
<p>Interesting, I wonder how that law ever passed. Texas is a huge state, but you would get “brain drain” as the bright kids who didn’t get in under the 10% rule or would be shut out of the flagship universities due to the quick fill for freshman would probably leave the state to find equal caliber schools and perhaps never return to the state. It is a strange situation indeed. Probably good for Rice, though LOL.</p>
<p>A case in point – a bright, Hispanic kid at my son’s private school was not in the top 10% at this very competitive school. He was not accepted to the University of Texas, but was accepted to Rice and MIT!</p>
<p>fireflyscout, I agree. Football is the ace in the hole.</p>
<p>I had a professor who explained the 10% as an attempt to serve the top students through out the state. </p>
<p>momof4boys, My son’s high school college information packet for juniors includes links to dozens of colleges located in Texas. I’m not worried about brain drain here. In my experience, not only do most students stay here in Texas, those who leave tend to come back once they start having families of their own.</p>
<p>The goal of the legislation was to allow students from those schools in podunk towns to have a chance to attend UT. Otherwise you only end up with students who attend the “top schools” or private schools. I think the legislation had good goals but was poorly written.</p>
<p>mom3, The original goal of the top 10% rule was to allow for differences in schools after the courts struck down affirmative action on racial basis. The thought was that the bright kids in some “podunk” Rio Grande town should be able to go to the top schools that were financed by the state despite not having AP classes, SAT prep and good college guidance counselors.<br>
Never really worked out like the ideal… What has happened is that neighboring states are siphoning up the second decile with big scholarships. Meanwhile great students below the top 10% don’t even apply because they assume they won’t get in.<br>
Big mess all around.</p>