At a time when they are cutting at least an additional $65 million from the UW System on top of $250 million of previously announced cuts, Republicans took aim yet again at the UW at this week's public hearing of the Assembly Colleges and Universities Committee. The hearing was one of the most embarrassing meetings I've ever been a part of in my 13-year legislative career.
In September, the racially-obsessed Center for Equal Opportunity (CEO), a small conservative think tank vigorously opposed to affirmative action and bilingual education, issued a study attacking UW-Madison's admissions policy.
The study was an incomplete, incoherent report lacking any information on education quality, graduation rates or transfers, nor did it include any relevant information about admissions versus enrollment at UW-Madison. Instead, it was full of opinion based on ignorance of racial bias in this country.
Apparently, a study that has received absolutely zero academic corroboration from peer researchers is what will earn you an invitation before the Wisconsin Legislature. And that's exactly what happened when Rep. Steve Nass (R-Whitewater) convened the Assembly Committee on Colleges and Universities for an exclusive presentation by CEO.
The hearing was a bust, with a lawyer from Virginia coming into our Capitol and telling our education professionals how to run our universities. The UW-Madison admissions policy clearly states academic achievements are the most important factors in the admissions process.
During the hearing, CEO President, Roger Klegg, dodged a question about where CEO gets its funding. He later admitted to receiving money from one source, but did not admit to receiving $240,000 from the Koch brothers, as was reported by the Center for American Progress.
Mr. Klegg also stated that he observed a lot of diversity when he visited our campus, which was made up of 13.2 percent students of color in 2009 according to the UW's website. Ironically, it wasn't long ago that UW-Madison embarrassingly superimposed a person of color into a sports crowd to mask our lack of diversity. Frankly, a lack of diversity is anecdotally one of the problems our university has with retaining students of color and we should be doing more to encourage a diverse student population, not less.
The exclusive briefing by a conservative organization was at best, ignorant; at worst, an outright racist attempt to reduce diversity at UW-Madison. To advocate the elimination of race as a factor in the higher education admissions process is to admit we've achieved complete equality in Madison and America, which certainly isn't the case.
Dr. Martin Luther King had a dream and we should all be working toward it, not against it.
State Rep. Mark Pocan represents Wisconsin's 78th Assembly district. Please send all feedback to opinion@dailycardinal.com.
