The Trump administration is currently demanding extensive admissions data from the UCSD Medical School. This is a clear threat to the academic freedom and independence of the university’s ability to have control over their own admissions policies.
The University of California should not comply with this unconstitutional demand. Instead, it should preserve academic freedom and independence and protect the identity and personal information of its students and applicants to the extent legally possible.
If you are ready to take action, click on this link to send a communication to UC President James B. Milliken and UCSD Chancellor Pradeep Khosla today
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The Department of Justice (DOJ) is seeking materials including admissions policies and procedures, documents concerning the use or nonuse of race in admissions, applicant-level admissions data, admissions outcomes and related analyses by race and other internal records related to admissions practices. The DOJ has requested multiple years of student applicant information, including MCAT scores, GPA, extracurricular activities, essays, admissions outcomes, demographic information, test scores, and home ZIP codes. Their deadline for this information is this Friday, April 24, and they are threatening to withhold federal funds for the UCSD medical school unless the data is released.
An advisory letter from the American Association of University Professors (AAUP) explains how this demand is unconstitutional and dangerous for individual students. The letter emphasizes that institutions should protect the personal information of students, applicants, faculty, and staff, and also notes that the broad disclosure of identifiable or re-identifiable admissions data may raise privacy, confidentiality, and academic-freedom concerns.
Because medical school cohorts are small, transmitting highly detailed, disaggregated admissions data could make individual students easier to identify.
Further, these demands are part of an ongoing attack on academic freedom and federal funding. The UC faculty associations have challenged this administration in court several times within the last year and have won injunctions protecting and restoring federal grants and federal funding to the university.