 | The Cavalier daily Monday, December 18, 1972 |  |
Duty To Virginia vs. National Institution
Out-Of-State Cutback Harmful To Education
(Cavalier Daily staff writer Sam Barnes conducted the
following interviews with University officials as an in-depth
follow-up to interviews in Friday's paper with State Sen. William
F. Stone and University President Edgar F. Shannon.–Ed.)
Out-of-state enrollments at the University and particularly
its professional schools have been targets of pressure from many
sources in the state.
University Vice-president for Public Affairs Edwin M.
Crawford said the University is feeling pressure to accept
qualified Virginians as a result of "genuine concern" on the part
of alumni, legislators and the families of applicants.
"We received more calls of concern from these people last year
than ever before, since we were unable to accept many applicants
who had been placed on the waiting list," Mr. Crawford said.
These students had been essentially told that they were
qualified for acceptance to the University but that they were
tentatively on the waiting list until someone refused the
University's offer of acceptance, he said.
"We never dreamed we'd get the response that we did last year,
however. Not many of the students we accepted turned us down,
so many of those qualified Virginians could not be offered
positions."
Mr. Crawford said that he has little doubt that the University
has rejected some qualified Virginians in the past, but added that
"our policy this year will allow us more flexibility and hopefully
allow us to take all qualified Virginians."
"Of course, our qualifications are very high," he noted. "The
qualifications of this year's class are higher than they've ever been
before."
The political pressure on the University has not come so much
from the state legislature as from the individual state legislators,
Mr. Crawford said. Most of this pressure has also been on the
behalf of individual applicants.
"Just about any political leader would tell us that our
obligation is to Virginians, and I would have to agree. On the
other hand, there is a great deal of concern by alumni, students
and Virginians in general to maintain the University as a national
institution," Mr. Crawford claimed.
According to admission directors for the University and its
Law and Medical schools, however, the University stands to lose
much of its national prominence and academic quality should this
pressure force severe out-of-state enrollment cuts.
| Out-Of-State | In-State |
| 63% | 37% |
| Out-Of-State | In-State | |
| 1965 | 96.8% | 3.2% |
| 1966 | 95.7% | 4.3% |
| 1967 | 84.8% | 15.2% |
| 1968 | 82.6% | 17.4% |
| 1969 | 49.9% | 50.1% |
| 1970 | 81.8% | 18.2% |
| 1971 | 88.5% | 11.5% |
| Out-Of-State | In-State |
| 39% | 61% |
"Our situation is very
unique," Dean of Admissions
Ernest H. Ern observed. "We
have a public institution with
a relatively high percentage of
out-of-state students and with
an extremely high endowment
coming predominately from
non-Virginia sources."
These characteristics belong
to a national University, and
that's what the University
is–at least for the present.
Should out-of-state
enrollments be drastically cut,
however, Mr. Ern thinks the
future status of the University
as a "national" institution
might be in jeopardy.
Mr. Ern said that a
limitation on out-of-state
enrollment might harm
relations with alumni. He
noted that alumni have been
supportive to the University in
fiscal as well as moral aspects.
According to Alumni Fund
Director Clay E. Delauney,
out-of-state sources have
traditionally supplied about
two-thirds of the total alumni
funds from year to year.
"These [out-of-state]
alumni are going to hope that
their own offspring, as well as
young people from their
particular regions have access
to the University of Virginia,"
Mr. Ern said.
In-state alumni would be to
some extent divided, Mr. Ern
thinks, over the question of
out-of-state enrollment
cutbacks. However "the vast
majority of in-state alumni
would want the University to
maintain the very unique
character that it has had as a
national institution."
The national prominence
held by the University is
instrumental in gaining support
from larger foundations such as
the Ford foundation, Mr. Ern
said.
"Primarily foundations are
going to continue to fund
those places at which exciting
educational things are going
on."
"There is more in the way
of an educational experience
than what one gains in actual
classroom contact," Mr. Ern
said.
The University maintains
diversity in the student body
that ultimately provides a good
deal of this outside
education," he said.
The University stands to lose
up to $3 million per year in
revenue from out-of-state
tuitions should non-resident
enrollments be out
appreciably.
Ernest H. Ern
Compensation for such
losses would more than likely
have to come from out-of-state
tuition increases rather than
from state sources, according
to Mr. Ern.
"It appears that the state
educational dollar is shrinking,
and since the burden must be
placed either upon the
taxpayer or the person taking
advantage of the educational
opportunity, it would appear
likely that there might be a
tuition increase for out-of-state
students."
The Board of Visitors, in
deciding to freeze out-of-state
admissions of entering classes
at this fall's numerical total,
was trying to come up with "a
number that the University
could live with in comfortable
fashion rather than having
something imposed upon it,"
according Mr. Ern.
"The Board was clearly
reacting to what they
anticipated to be a move in the
state of Virginia by the
legislature to impose controls
on out-of-state enrollment."
"The board has set a figure
which is to persist for a
number of years which will
have to be evaluated on an
annual basis to determine its
good and bad effects."
On the admissions
procedures at state schools, Mr.
Ern said that he could not
agree with Sen. Stone's
suggestion to establish a
standard set of admissions
qualifications for all state
supported schools in Virginia.
If standard qualifications
were employed "it would be
detrimental to any form of
education," he claimed. "We
attempt to use subjective
evaluation of applicants, but
what Sen. Stone is saying is to
make it completely objective."
Mr. Ern also said that the
University would probably
have to expand to hold all
"qualified" applicants under
such a system.
"We are a very desirable
institution, and if those
limitations were set up it
would be a very difficult thing
for the University to live with
and at the same time maintain
something even close to the
character that it has now."
Mr. Ern said that
justification for the "national"
character of the University in
spite of its support from the
state could come from both
the large amount of
endowment funds received
from out-of-state sources and
from the fact that the
University, as an institution of
"national prominence," is a
true resource to the state.
"By the same token this is
the type of thing that attracts
faculty members to come to an
institution that's not a local
institution or not exclusively a
regional institution, but rather
a national institution."
"Should the University have
to reverse itself and become
more of a regional institution,
however, some of the faculty
will undoubtedly start to look
elsewhere."
| Institution | 1970 - 1971 | 1971 - 1972 | 1972 - 1973 |
| University of Virginia | 45% | 50% | 45% |
| University of Wisconsin | – | 31% | 20% |
| University of Michigan | 54% | 45% | 49% |
| University of California, Berkley | 33% | 32% | 38% |
| University of Minnesota [*] |
20% | 20% | 20% |
| University of Texas[**] | 22% | 15% | 15% |
| The Cavalier daily Monday, December 18, 1972 | |