...The (auditor) report was especially critical of Berkeley, saying that campus "admitted children of staff and donors instead of more qualified applicants."
In many cases, the admissions officers at Berkeley who read applications wanted to do the right thing but were overruled. For instance, the report notes the child of a staff member and the child of a donor were not recommended for admission by either reader but were admitted. A third applicant -- from a low-income family, who attended "a disadvantaged school" and was in the top 9 percent of the applicant's high school class -- was recommended for admission by both readers. The applicant was rejected.
"In those interactions, the development office often provided the admissions office with the names of applicants connected to donors and potential donors. In one of the years we reviewed, the development office indicated which of the applicants were 'priority.' UC Berkeley admitted every applicant that the development office indicated was a priority. None of these applicants had received ratings on their applications that would have made them competitive on their own merit for admission to UC Berkeley," the report said.
"The former admissions director also openly invited staff to send her names of family and friends who had applied so that she could personally review the applications," the report added. "In 2014, 2015, and 2016, the former admissions director sent an email to UC Berkeley staff offering to review the applications of applicants they might know, in one year describing that she was doing so 'in the spirit of professional camaraderie.'"
The report added, "Finally, UC Berkeley allowed admissions staff to request preferential treatment for relatives and donors by using a process intended to benefit applicants who come from disadvantaged backgrounds. UC Berkeley allows admissions staff to nominate applicants for additional consideration by placing them on a list it calls the prospect list. The emails that UC Berkeley’s admissions leadership sent to admissions staff indicate that the prospect list is for applicants who participate in UC Berkeley’s outreach programs, which generally assist disadvantaged high school and transfer students in preparing for and applying to college. The emails from the two more recent years -- 2018 and 2019 -- also state that the staff could add 'other applicants to watch.' Although the majority of applicants whom admissions staff nominated were connected with these outreach programs, staff also placed applicants on the prospect list for inappropriate reasons, including the applicants’ connections to donors, staff, and faculty. UC Berkeley admitted several of these applicants while denying admission to similar or better‑rated students whom staff legitimately had placed on the prospect list because they had participated in a campus outreach program -- the very applicants whom the prospect list was supposed to benefit." ...
Full story at: https://www.insidehighered.com/admissions/article/2020/09/28/university-california-admissions-scandal-worsens
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