Regents Censure Chairman

SAN FRANCISCO-The UC Board of Regents passed a resolution censuring their own chairman, John Moores, yesterday after an hour of unusually intense argument over his public accusations that the university still uses race as a factor in admissions.

The board split in an 8-6 vote over a resolution, which contained a stinging rebuke of Moores for an editorial piece published in Forbes magazine this month.

The article argued that by letting in marginally academically qualified students in place of higher-achieving students, UC Berkeley admissions discriminated against Asian Americans.

"The largest single group that scored over 1400 and had over a 4.0 were Asian Americans," Moores said. "A lot of people see this as a victimless crime, because those are really smart kids who probably went elsewhere, but I don't."

Some regents felt Moores, as chairman of UC's highest body, had alienated underrepresented students, and that the resolution was needed to clear the board's position.

"Because of this, there are students that can not walk Telegraph Avenue without being intimidated because of the nature of their ethnicity," said Regent Odessa Johnson. "While this puts me in a difficult position, it says to these students that they belong at Berkeley."

UC Regent Ward Connerly, a staunch affirmative action opponent, rushed to Moores' defense.

"We are contemplating the adoption of a resolution to censor a member of the board," Connerly said. "Why do we need to do this? This isn't right."

Moores called the resolution outrageous and claimed it was an assault on his free speech.

"There is delicious irony in that my work was about Berkeley," Moores said. "Does anybody remember the Free Speech movement?"

Other regents lamented that the board no longer felt open for argument.

"This is not the congenial board I entered 10 years ago where I felt proud about disagreeing with others," said UC Regent Peter Preuss. "What's happening to this body?"

As part of his remarks on the findings of an admissions study group, Moores lashed out at the university for withholding reports and data that he said pointed to the continuing role of race in admissions despite a statewide affirmative action ban.

"Comprehensive review is especially not auditable," he said. "It looks to me that it's ripe for fraud."

Preliminary figures from a draft of a 2002 UC study predicted that a black student who applied to UC Berkeley had twice as much a chance at being accepted compared to a white applicant with a similar GPA, test scores and other factors.

UC officials say the study was a crude representation of admissions and has since been updated to include more factors.

A version released last week showed that black and Latino students continue to be accepted at higher rates than would be expected but with smaller discrepancies.

"We are examining whether these are artifacts of the model or whether preferences might still exist," said Bruce Darling, senior vice president of university affairs.

He added that the data was not disclosed earlier because it was a work in progress.

UC officials continued to stress that black and Latino students are vastly underrepresented at UC. Less than 2 percent of black California high school graduates are eligible to apply to the university, compared to nearly one-third of Asian students.

Since last fall, Moores has emerged as a leading critic of the university's admissions practices and of whether race still lingers as a factor in admissions.

Last fall, he released a personal investigation of UC Berkeley admissions. The report revealed that 400 students were accepted to UC Berkeley with SAT scores lower than 1,000, while about twice as many who scored well were rejected. About two-thirds of the low-scoring admits were underrepresented students.

Berdahl lambasted Moore's "inaccurate and damaging assault" to the admissions process.

"We believe that our process is fair to students, legal under California law and fully consistent with admissions policy set by the University of California Board of Regents," Berdahl wrote.

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