Will Texas's Admissions Policy Hurt Athletics?

In his continuing campaign against Texas's "10 percent" admissions policy, University of Texas President William Powers suggested last week that the rule theoretically might force the school to stop accepting out-of-state and international students and make it more difficult to admit special-case students such as musicians and athletes, the Austin American-Statesman reports.

Powers was referring to a state law that automatically admits the top 10 percent of every Texas high school graduating class into the UT system's flagship college in Austin. Currently, 81 percent of the freshmen admitted to UT-Austin are admitted through this law. Thanks partially to the economy, Powers expects that number to rise to 86 percent this fall. That leaves very little room for everyone else, including out-of-state students and in-state skilled musicians or athletes who do not graduate near the top of their high schools classes.

Without some change to the law, UT will be forced to reject all Texas high school graduates who are not in the top 10 percent by 2013, according to a report by the university. By 2015, the report said, there will be no room in the freshman class for students from other states or countries.

"It has become a crisis for us," Powers said. "We're simply out of space."

A Texas spokesman tells Paper Trail that should such circumstances arise, the university would try to increase its enrollment rather than cut out-of-state enrollment or programs like sports and music.

Powers made his comments after testifying before the Texas Senate Higher Education Committee, which voted 4 to 1 to revise the law and allow the school to limit how many students it admits under the 10 percent policy.

According to the American-Statesman, the proposed legislation would "admit students ranking in the top 1 percent, the top 2 percent and so forth until half of the slots were filled. The remaining slots would be filled through what [bill sponsor Sen. Florence Shapiro] called a 'holistic' examination of the pool of applicants, taking into account leadership, musical and artistic talent, race, ethnicity, and other factors."

Next, the revised legislation goes to the full state Senate, which approved similar legislation two years ago. That law revision later failed in the House.

More about Texas's dilemma is in the Chronicle of Higher Education.