Skimming the top

William Powers Jr., president of the University of Texas at Austin, was in the Rio Grande Valley on Tuesday discussing a change in the state law that guaranteed the top 10 students in every high school graduating class automatic admission into the state-run university of their choice.

The law, enacted in 1997, was a response to a U.S. Supreme Court decision banning race-based college admissions. By enabling the top students in all districts, including minority districts, to enroll in top universities, the legislation guaranteed that some minority students would automatically get in.

As is the case with virtually every law enacted to force an issue, this one had unintended consequences. UT officials say it actually hurt campus diversity.

Ethnicity isn’t the only factor in the complex demographic tapestry of our society. With the state’s population growing faster than UT’s capacity, greater percentages of its freshman class comprised "top 10" students. This year they made up 85 percent of the class’ last year it was 81 percent.

Factor in the university’s athletic recruits, and that leaves few slots available for other students.

Because the university was bound by law to accept the academic cream of the crop, it was forced to reject many students who weren’t at the top of their class but who had special talents, skills and interests that not only would benefit from matriculation at the university, but would benefit the student body as a whole. While it achieved ethnic diversity, the law reduced cultural diversity in many ways, UT officials said.

The Texas Legislature addressed the issue this year in passing Senate Bill 175, authored by Sen. Florence Shapiro, R-Plano. The new law allows universities to cut off top 10 enrollment at 50 percent of its incoming class.

UT-Brownsville and Texas Southmost College President Juliet Garcia earlier this year noted that the change benefits local universities, including hers and UT-Pan American, by steering more of the region’s top high school graduates to the local universities. It would reduce the "brain drain" that many people count as a factor hurting the Valley’s economic and cultural development.

That might or might not be the case. It’s likely that students in the top 10 of their class will receive acceptance, and even scholarship offers, from other top universities. So a student unable to attend his first choice, UT or Texas A&M, for example, probably still has a chance to go to another major university such as Princeton, Baylor or SMU. Would they choose to stay home and attend UTB-TSC or UTPA instead? Many won’t.

The local universities, unfortunately, are at a disadvantage. They are relatively young compared to many other institutions, and are still developing many programs — programs that already are well established elsewhere. And it stands to reason that the area’s brightest students, as the top 10 generally are, won’t choose to stay in the Valley when their chosen field of study can best be developed elsewhere, even if it isn’t at UT.

The onus, therefore, is on the local universities, to continue developing programs that earn respect within their respective fields and in the education community.

In addition, the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board, which controls the development of such programs, should recognize that limiting admissions at the flagship universities also limits the educational opportunities for many of the state’s best students. They should consider this fact whenever they are asked to decide whether or not to allow a new program at a secondary university.

Certainly, the change in admissions rules isn’t a perfect fix, but the 10 percent rule isn’t perfect either. Unfortunately, this is what happens when lawmakers try to use artificial means to fix perceived problems.