AggieWJM
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Post by AggieWJM on Nov 15, 2007 7:18:37 GMT -5
By Lanita Withers Staff Writer Thursday, Nov. 15, 2007 3:00 am Credit: News & Record file GREENSBORO — It just got harder to be an Aggie.
N.C. A&T's Board of Trustees approved tougher admissions standards during its regular meeting Wednesday, requiring that in-state applicants have an SAT score of at least 750 and a minimum high school GPA of 2.25 to be considered for admission.
For out-of-state applicants, even more is required: an SAT score of 950 or higher and a GPA of at least 2.85.
The changes are expected to help the university increase its retention and its four- and six-year graduation rates, measures that the UNC System has given all public universities five years to improve.
In recent years, the university had allowed students with SAT scores below 700 to enter the university, Provost Janice Brewington said.
The university's average SAT score has steadily decreased for the past decade. By the fall of 2006, it had dropped almost 200 points lower than the UNC System average.
If the new policy had been in place in the fall of 2006 , 326 freshmen — 16 percent of the entering class — would not have been admitted to the university.
"Kids were probably accepted below 700 when we were trying to raise the enrollment," Chairwoman Velma Speight-Buford said.
The new standards could mean the university's enrollment decreases next year, she said. But she also pointed to two historically black universities in the state, N.C. Central and Winston-Salem State, which saw their numbers initially dip then rebound after bolstering their admissions requirements.
"When people start looking at schools, they look to see what your standards are," Speight-Buford said.
The new policy also adds a 25 percent tuition surcharge for students who take more than 140 credit hours in the pursuit of a degree. It takes 124-128 hours to complete an undergraduate degree at the university.
The new standards will go into effect starting in fall 2008 .
The measure passed by a
10-1 vote, with Trustee Franklin McCain voting against the policy. He said he wasn't against higher standards, but thought the out-of-state requirement was too drastic.
McCain also expressed concern that the policy would exclude the kinds of students A&T was chartered to help, such as his sophomore roommate in the 1960s.
"When he came to A&T, I bet he was not on the scale for the SAT," McCain said. But that roommate, Herman Thomas , went on to graduate from A&T and Duke University with honors, earn a doctoral degree and teach at UNC-Charlotte and serve as the provost at Shaw University, he said.
In closed session, the board heard an update on the university's response to critical internal and state audits.
The university has completed a report responding to all the issues the audit raised, Speight-Buford said, adding that officials from the UNC System office and the state budget office were satisfied with the university's proposals.
Contact Lanita Withers at 373-7071 or lwithers@news-record.com
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Post by Bigboy on Nov 15, 2007 8:40:46 GMT -5
The new out-of-state requirements will make it even harder to recruit out-of-state athletes. I agree with F. McCain that the new out-of-state requirements are too drastic. I feel the new in-state requirements are still rather low.
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Post by Bornthrilla on Nov 15, 2007 8:51:31 GMT -5
Based on the new GPA requirements for out-of-state students, I wouldn't have gotten in.
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Gator
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Post by Gator on Nov 15, 2007 9:37:06 GMT -5
Based on those requirements a lot of folks will not get in. I hope there's some flexability there. I think this will hurt more so than help. Who knows, maybe the Chancelors scholarship program will help to offset this change.
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Post by DOOMS on Nov 15, 2007 10:46:38 GMT -5
I wouldn't have gotten in myself unless they did a sliding scale, i.e. higher S.A.T. allows for a lower g.p.a.
That would be a good thing to implement now. A higher g.p.a. allows for a lower SAT and vice versa.
That being said, as far as I'm concerned the out-of-state requirements should be the in-state requirements. Lest we forget, the scale for the SAT has changed. The improved requirements are just plain poor. 750 SAT and a 2.25 gpa? Those numbers are what community college is for. You can go to any state community college and transfer into any state four year institution upon completion. At the community college level you will get the closer instruction those scores clearly indicate you need in order to be successful in higher education. The dumbing down of A&T should have ceased a long time ago. It cheapens the worth of our degrees.
It isn't 1932 anymore. People have a myriad of opportunities to receive education. We don't have to open the doors to every "po Black chile" in America because there are numerous avenues that just weren't there at the time of the inception of A&T. We should be encouraging people to use those avenues to better themselves, not to come to A&T to worsen themselves and the institution.
I hope that it's simply a misquote, but for the chair of the board to state "Kids were probably accepted below 700 when we were trying to raise the enrollment" as if she didn't know when I'd heard that over four years ago and I wasn't even living in the state... There's a disconnect there. There's a problem there. The board should be fully aware of these things. But again, it's probably a misquote.
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Post by da1andonle on Nov 15, 2007 12:20:31 GMT -5
Well said.
Also, for the last couple of years A&T has accepted just about anybody. While I was teaching high school I remember when they would have instant enrollment days where you would bring a transcript and the 35 dollars and be accepted on the spot. I know for a fact that some of those kids should't have been accepted.
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@ProfBellamy
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Post by @ProfBellamy on Nov 15, 2007 12:50:32 GMT -5
No, the SAT scores only reflect Verbal and Math portions. The writing section isn't dealt with in this situation.
However, because in-state students are paying a subsidized tuition cost by the tax payers they have the first priority. Therefore, out of state students are coming into a system as "guests." Out of State students have always held to a higher standard and in most cases it would take more than a 2.85 and a 950. If we look at our peer institutions entry GPA and SAT (peers in the system are: UNCC and UNCG) we're still at the bottom for these entry requirements.
The UNC System's tuition for out of state students is one of the best values in the nation. I've seen the data and sit on committees that make proposals regarding tuition. A&T is not increasing Tuition... unlike our flagship counterpart UNC-Chapel Hill. So, out of state students should be lucky to be able to get in. (I am one...even though I lived in NC for most of my life).
PM me for more of my take on this situation. Because, its bigger than what it seems.
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Post by Aggie One on Nov 15, 2007 13:27:42 GMT -5
I must be old. When I entered A&T back in '74 you had to have 800 SAT and a 2.5 GPA. Even under these "new standards", it still would be a piece of cake for me to get in even now with my scores from back then. Kids are just have to start buckling down and study more and party less.
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Post by DOOMS on Nov 15, 2007 13:42:28 GMT -5
Uh, A-1, '74 was 33 years ago.
Hell, I came in '90 and people call me "old-timer."
I think you are starting to see one of the main reasons behind a lot of the less than flowery reports coming out of 1600 E. Market Street. da1andonle’s tales of “instant enrollment” are totally true. I’d heard about it and witnessed several myself. I took my little cousin to one and thankfully she decided she wasn’t ready for college so she didn’t go. One of her friends went and failed out… twice. The way to shore this up is to increase the standards and decrease the enrollment, period.
Just last night I was reviewing my grades. The highest grades I got in my life were at A&T. And I didn't do a great deal of studying.
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Post by da1andonle on Nov 15, 2007 13:54:07 GMT -5
These are the reasons why enrollment went way up so fast and rennick looked so good from the outside and probably why he left. Theres no way you can maintain a University with that as your base. But the part thats crazy to me is that when enrollment went up so did tuition, and the price of everything else on campus for that matter.
Anybody know why that was?
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Post by DOOMS on Nov 15, 2007 14:11:06 GMT -5
Probably because the cost of doing business went up across the board. When Renick came aboard I could've bought a house in DC for 100 grand. The same house is now 550 grand. Gas was like a dollar. Now it's three dollars. The dollar movie is now two dollars. You have to pay people to keep up with that kind of inflation. The money came in tuition.
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Post by Aggie One on Nov 15, 2007 14:19:27 GMT -5
Thanks for reminding me of my age Dooms. Geezzz.
I guess kids I went to school with were more committed to academics coming up as the first line of new black youth produced from the civil rights movement of the mid and late 60's.
I sense that true commitment just isn't there anymore for academic achievement or any real sense of importance or true understanding of the history of the black struggle for lot of the black kids growing up now. It 's been replaced with a lot of quick fixes, a lot of superfulous bling, and gross self indulgence.
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Post by DOOMS on Nov 15, 2007 14:27:24 GMT -5
...and a lot of lowering of the bar to coax them (hell, us) along.
And you ain't getting older, just better.
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Maxell
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Post by Maxell on Nov 15, 2007 14:32:42 GMT -5
Dammit. No more excuses. If we parallel the raised requirements with clear communication to the high schools. It's a GREAT thing. If kids that even considered A&T knew what thay had to do in the 9th grade, they would be fine. My son got in by the hair of his chinny chin chin but he busted his but his senior year in high school and had a 3.7 GPA after hovering in the low to mid 2's before that. He finally got serious.
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Freeze
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Post by Freeze on Nov 15, 2007 15:36:09 GMT -5
750 SAT and a 2.25 gpa? Those numbers are what community college is for. You can go to any state community college and transfer into any state four year institution upon completion. At the community college level you will get the closer instruction those scores clearly indicate you need in order to be successful in higher education. The dumbing down of A&T should have ceased a long time ago. It cheapens the worth of our degrees. I am a little conflicted by this discussion and by this decision. Let me tell you my story. I graduated from high school in 1993 with a 2.3 gpa and a 760 on the SAT. It's not that I was a dumb kid, but I never applied myself and I take full blame for that. I had parents that pushed me, supported me, and disciplined me, but I never made that support translate into better grades. I got into A&T and to Central. I went to Central my freshmen year because I wanted to be different than everybody else. My father, mother, brother, uncle, and cousins went to A&T so I wanted a change of pace. I went to Central but I transferred after my freshmen year because my father passed suddenly and I wanted to be closer to my mom and closer to something I was more familiar with. Academically speaking, I performed fairly decent at Central but my life entered into a crossroads after my fathers passing. I arrived at A&T with the world on my shoulders and a lot of sorrow in my heart but my saving grace was that I had professors who believed in me when I didnt even believe in myself. They knew me already because my dad was an alumn of the same department and my brother was finishing up his senior year. They lit a fire up under me and made me passionate about the field of history and would not let me feel sorry for myself. I finished A&T with honors and was accepted into grad school at Ohio State where I finished my doctorate in September 06. Under these new regulations, I would have just made it...maybe. But I wonder if our zeal to become more selective could be focused more on the state of public education and how so many of our children are now coming to college lacking BASIC skills. And I do mean BASIC. These are issues that not even I had to deal with when I graduated from high school. There is a major difference between a kid who has never applied himself and a kid who just doesnt possess the basic skills to succeed at the next level. I am now a professor at a HBCU and I feel sorry for the kids because its not their fault. The problem is systemic and its institutional. The broken system is public education and the broken institutions are the family and the church. Making admissions policies tougher fails to address any of these major issues and I fear that kids who still need the same nurturing environment that I and many of you were privliged to enjoy will pay the price. It's a catch 22...damned if you do, damned if you don't. But in my humble opinion, until we fix these broken institutions and systems we will continue to see MAJOR problems in the Black community.
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