University of Illinois President B. Joseph White says he will reform the school's admissions policies in just eight weeks, the Chronicle of Higher Education reports. White's pledge comes one week after a state panel blamed the school's administrators and trustees for an admissions scandal that erupted in May.
Planned reforms include abolition of the "Category-I" list, a classification that allowed applicants with favorable connections to university administrators to receive preferential acceptances to the 70,000-student university. White also said Illinois will build a "fire wall" around the admissions process to further protect it from the whims of influential university officials. "We must leave admissions decisions to the admissions professionals," he says.
Though the panel called for the resignation of all the school's trustees, neither White nor the chancellor of the university's flagship Urbana-Champaign campus, Richard Herman, have said they plan to follow all of the panel's recommendation. White did, however, publicly apologize Tuesday for his role in the school's unacceptable admissions practices.
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V. Ritas of IL 3:51AM August 20, 2009