University of Virginia Library

Colloquium

One More Shot
At Admissions

By Myles Tronic

Tom Collier aptly prefaced his
article on black recruitment in the
March 23 issue of The Cavalier
Daily with the statement, "During
the fall semester many students
were criticizing the administration
policies toward black recruitment.
The Office of Admissions and
consequently Dean Ern was the
focal point of this criticism."

I hope, however, that this will
be the last critical shot to be taken
at the Office of Admissions, at least
for a while. The Admissions Office
does need time to vindicate itself. I
regret that Mr. Ern has had to be
the single victim of so much verbal
venom, for he is one of the only
deans at this University that I have
ever had a chance to talk to and get
to know somewhat.

On a brisk fall morning, approximately
a year ago last November,
in a small but very tastefully
furnished parlor, I was introduced
to Mr. Ern and a discussion ensued
for about fifteen or twenty minutes.
The place was not Charlottesville
but Southborough, Massachusetts,
a town which, believe it or
not makes Charlottesville look like
a metropolis.

At the time there seemed to be
nothing wrong with the fact that
the Dean of Admissions of the
University had come up to New
England to interview boys of
various prep schools in the area. I
had been interviewed by a number
of other deans of admissions from
Northern colleges. I might add here
that visits from college admissions
directors to boarding schools are very
common.

Now that I am at the University,
this appears to have been blatantly
wrong and highly unnecessary
especially when Virginia, more than
any other university is poverty stricken
in respect to heterogeneity
with reference to black education
and co-education.

Whereas schools with equally
bad reputations for exclusiveness
have done much to remedy segregation,
this school has not, and it may
not be sufficient to run ads in the
classified section of the Cavalier
Daily for students wishing to aid in
black recruitment.

As much as I would like to
credit students in the University
with the ability to be of some
benefit in the recruitment of black
students, I cannot make myself
believe that they would be as apt as
people with the time and knowledge
for recruiting.

I don't think that I am being
rash in stating that this program is,
more likely than not, starting out
on the wrong foot. The roles of
students and administrators are
exactly opposite of what they
should be. If time must be spent
visiting socially acceptable boarding
schools, it would be well to leave
this entirely up to students and
members of the Alumni Association.

Deans Ern and Kinard do not
have to waste their time visiting
students who know pretty well
what colleges they want to attend
and who do not have to look into
scholarship programs. A visit from
Dean Ern, or even President Shannon
could not be any more
convincing than a visit from a
University student to a Northern
prep schooler who nine times out
of ten will go to the Ivy League if
accepted rather than Virginia.

On the other end of the
spectrum, a predominantly black
high school in which college counseling
is not in most cases what it
should be, is in far greater need of a
representative from the Office of
Admissions and Financial Aid.

Whereas it is the line of work of
this aforementioned person to recruit
students for the University, it
is certainly not the line of work of
a Virginia student whose occupation
is just that and not "admission
officer," nor is it the major concern
of a member of the Alumni
Association recruitment for the
University but rather business and
financial interests.

Perhaps members of the Alumni
Association are least qualified of all
in light of black recruitment due to
their general lack of awareness of
what is going on at the University
at a given time. (e.g. My father was
graduated from the University
almost forty years ago and to this
very day believes that most people
around here always wear coats and
ties. The fact that he presently has
two sons here and has been coming
back to Charlottesville frequently
seems to have little bearing on this
assumption. There are many more
serious misconceptions on the part
of other alumni I have known.)

The emphasis on prep schools
has not only been needless but has
also served to perpetuate perhaps
the mistaken view of outsiders that
the University is still a breeding
place for snob from the South and
North alike. This view compounds
the fracture of the University being
almost completely white.

With this sort of reputation
which the University has, one might
ask why a qualified black student
should even want to come here.
Logically, in its present state, the
University would definitely be a
place which blacks would shy away
from. What could possibly be an
incentive for coming here? The
only real incentive I can think of is
ample scholarships for those who
could not normally afford to come
here. In this one way, the University
could be more appealing than a
well-integrated college.

It is therefore vital that the
Office of Admissions and Financial
Aid take the major responsibility in
the problem of black recruitment
rather than University students and
members of the Alumni Association.