A recently proposed plan to reform the academic requirements in Los Angeles high schools may make more students eligible to apply to the University of California.
If approved, high school students in the Los Angeles Unified School District, beginning with freshmen in 2008, will have to complete 15 college preparatory courses, called the “A-G” sequence, in fields including English, math, science, history and foreign language.
Such courses are required of students for them to be considered eligible to apply to California public universities. The plan was introduced to the district board of education earlier this week.
But many high school and UC officials said they can’t predict at this time the effect the proposed plan may have on the competitiveness of the applicant pool to the UC.
Thus far, conclusions cannot be drawn about the changes that might take place in admissions to UC campuses if reforms are enacted, said Ravi Poorsina, a spokeswoman for the UC Office of the President. Though the reform is a positive step, Poorsina said, fulfilling eligibility requirements does not mean that students will be able to compete with other applicants to the UC.
Most students who are admitted to UCs have taken courses beyond the minimal requirements and have grade point averages significantly higher than the eligibility standard, she said.
Though the required GPA to apply to UCs is a 2.8, the average GPA of incoming freshman at campuses like UCLA and UC Berkeley is above a 4.0, Poorsina added.
By taking the minimum requirements some students will be in a position to later enroll in other more rigorous courses like honors and advanced placement classes, said Bob Collins, superintendent of District 1, which encompasses the western region of the San Fernando Valley. Collins said that he felt the proposal was long overdue and that once the new requirements are fully in place students will become better equipped to compete for admissions to many of California’s higher education institutions.
“When we have a culture in which we care about our students, when we have expectations for our students, everybody benefits,” he said.
But Jeannie Oakes, a UCLA education professor, said though college preparatory courses are necessary, other reforms are also needed to make students at local high schools competitive applicants, including tutoring and test preparation programs.
These programs, while available at high schools in suburbs, are lacking at high schools in central Los Angeles, said Oakes, who for the past five years has researched the college track program at local high schools.
The proposal comes at a time when students in some schools have indicated that they found out too late in their high school careers about the coursework they needed to take to be considered by a California public university, said Susan Cox, a spokeswoman for the Los Angeles Unified School District.
The proposal has sparked a debate between those who agree with the introduced plan and others who are concerned that making college preparatory courses a requirement will cause more students to drop out of high school.
Oakes said that her research indicates that students placed in more challenging classes do better academically.
“Nobody knows what exactly will happen,” she said. “Research suggests that kids will do at least no worse and probably better.”
Collins said that in his district, after requiring students to make graduation and post-graduation plans, college attendance rates increased dramatically and he expects similar positive results from requiring students to complete more rigourous courses.
“Whenever we provide young people with higher expectations, they for the most part tend to reach those expectations,” he said.
In addition, proponents of the plan said though not all high school students want to attend universities, taking college preparatory classes will help them get accepted to vocational schools and get better paying jobs.
Many business and vocational training programs today are requiring academic skills attained in courses in the “A-G” sequence, Oakes said.
Before the district Board of Education votes on the proposal next month, the Curriculum and Instruction Committee, a permanent body that assesses the curriculum and reform plans, will discuss the proposal.
Julie Korenstein, a board member and member of the curriculum committee, said that there are many issues that require consideration before any action is taken.
One issue that needs to be addressed, she said, is how students, if accepted to a university, will pay for it, since 70 percent of students in the district are at the poverty level.