Report 2019-113 Recommendations
When an audit is completed and a report is issued, auditees must provide the State Auditor with information regarding their progress in implementing recommendations from our reports at three intervals from the release of the report: 60 days, six months, and one year. Additionally, Senate Bill 1452 (Chapter 452, Statutes of 2006), requires auditees who have not implemented recommendations after one year, to report to us and to the Legislature why they have not implemented them or to state when they intend to implement them. Below, is a listing of each recommendation the State Auditor made in the report referenced and a link to the most recent response from the auditee addressing their progress in implementing the recommendation and the State Auditor's assessment of auditee's response based on our review of the supporting documentation.
Recommendations in Report 2019-113: The University of California: Qualified Students Face an Inconsistent and Unfair Admissions System That Has Been Improperly Influenced by Relationships and Monetary Donations (Release Date: September 2020)
Recommendations to University of California | ||
---|---|---|
Number | Recommendation | Status |
1 | To protect the fairness and integrity of its admissions processes, the Office of the President should establish systemwide protocols for admissions processes by the fall 2021 admissions cycle that prohibit the following:
|
Fully Implemented |
2 | To protect the campuses' athletics admissions process from abuse, the Office of the President should require each campus to do the following by the fall 2021 admissions cycle:
|
Partially Implemented |
3 | The Office of the President should immediately require staff involved in making or informing admissions decisions to report all attempts to influence admissions decisions, regardless of source, to their supervisors or to the director of undergraduate admissions. |
Fully Implemented |
4 | Beginning with the fall 2021 admissions cycle, the Office of the President should oversee UC Berkeley's admissions process for at least three years. The Office of the President should ensure that all admissions decisions are merit-based and conform to the university's policies on admissions. Further, the Office of the President should facilitate the establishment of a culture of ethical conduct in admissions by providing regular training to admissions and development staff, conducting reviews of admissions decisions, and monitoring the admissions office's communications about applicants to ensure no inappropriate factors influence admissions activities. |
Will Not Implement |
5 | To ensure that the university maintains a fair and consistent admissions process, the Office of the President should require each campus to take the following actions:
|
Partially Implemented |
6 | To provide assurance that campuses' use of the admission by exception policy is aligned with the policy's purpose, beginning in June 2021, the Office of the President should annually select a random sample of applicants admitted by exception and verify that campuses recorded a rationale for each admission and that each rationale aligns with BOARS's guidance. |
Fully Implemented |
7 | To ensure that the university maintains a fair and unbiased admissions process, the Office of the President should require each campus to take the following actions:
|
Partially Implemented |
8 | To better ensure that implicit bias in the evaluation of applications does not affect applicants' chances at admission, the Office of the President should remove potentially biasing information from the application information that campuses can access. |
Will Not Implement |
9 | To ensure that it properly protects all admissions activity against improper influence, the Office of the President should require each campus's undergraduate admissions office to do the following:
|
Fully Implemented |
10 | To better safeguard the integrity of the university's admissions processes, the Office of the President should, by July 2021, begin conducting regular audits of the admissions processes at each of its undergraduate campuses, ensuring that it reviews each campus at least once every three years. These audits should be conducted by systemwide audit staff and include, but not be limited to, verification of special talents, communication between admissions staff and external parties regarding applicants, and other avenues for inappropriate influence on admissions discussed in this report. The audits should also endeavor to identify inappropriate admissions activity and deficiencies in the admissions process. The Office of the President should make the results of the audits public. |
Partially Implemented |
11 | To ensure that campuses adequately address deficiencies identified in its own internal audit, the Office of the President should immediately begin to assess whether the campuses have completed the corrective actions they developed in response to systemwide recommendations and should evaluate whether the campuses' actions adequately address the audit's concerns. |
Fully Implemented |
12 | To increase the number of high school students who have the opportunity to gain admission to the university through its ELC program, the Office of the President should, beginning in
|
Fully Implemented |