UC Regent asks for anonymous apps.

University of California Regent Ward Connerly sparked a heated debate last week after demanding that students' names be removed from UC applications in order to mask the race of each applicant. In a six-page letter to UC President Richard Atkinson, Connerly proposed that students using the new version of the UC application -- available in November -- use Social Security numbers instead of their names. UC spokesperson Terry Colvin said the proposal would have to be approved by the Regents before the new application is completed in April in order to affect students seeking admission to the UC system for fall 1998. He noted that the UC Office of the President -- which creates the common application used by all eight schools in the system -- retains ultimate authority over any changes to the form. Connerly, who was instrumental in the Regents' decision to end affirmative action programs two years ago, claims that applicants' names may give admissions officers a clue to the students' race, which could bias the admissions process. "A guy named Jamal Washington is probably black," Connerly wrote in the letter. He stressed that anonymous applications are the only way to ensure an entirely blind admissions process in accordance with the repeal of affirmative action. "The culture of this system has not changed significantly despite the ban on affirmative action," he wrote. "Many administrators would still use their desire to 'build diversity' as an excuse for racial and ethnic preference." UC Regents and admissions officials have reacted sharply to Connerly's proposal. UCLA Admissions Director Rae Lee Siporin said the proposal contradicts efforts to make the admissions process "more personal" by considering factors other than grades and test scores when evaluating applications. "There is a belief that things can always be done numerically and [the admissions process] doesn't work that way," she said. She explained that it is impossible to eliminate racial, sexual or other aspects of an applicant's identity simply by removing his or her name. "I think his statement is symbolic, unless Connerly intends to have a whole group of people with black pens marking out clubs, activities and anything in personal statements that could suggest the gender or race of each applicant," she said. Siporin added that Connerly's proposal also contradicts efforts to improve the impersonal image many students have of the UC admissions process. And UC Regent Jess Bravin said he also disagrees with the idea of removing names from applications. "It insults the integrity of admissions officers to say that they won't evaluate applications fairly unless they are anonymous," he said. Public universities in Texas have begun to omit ethnic data from their applications, but the proposal would make the UC schools the first to eliminate names from the admissions process.