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By Robert Birgeneau  As the chancellor of the University of California, Berkeley, I believe that it is my responsibility to use this office as a platform to advocate for the principles that guide and support public education. The first public issue that I have chosen is inclusion. I hope that you have had the opportunity to read my essay on the topic, excerpts of which appeared as an op-ed in the Los Angeles Times (www.berkeley.edu/news/media/releases /2005/03/29_oped.shtml). With this note, I want to share our strategy and goals concerning this topic. Racial inclusion is a public good, not a private benefit. Indeed, the president of the University of Mexico once said to me that the single most important skill for the 21st century that a student must learn as an undergraduate is what he termed “intercultural competence.” It is only through experience with and appreciation of other cultures that our citizens will be able to navigate successfully in today’s globalized society. Since the passage of Proposition 209, there has been a shocking drop in the number of underrepresented minorities on campus. Last year, there was not a single African American in the freshman class in the College of Engineering. UC Berkeley has the world’s number one rated engineering faculty, and no African-American freshman was there to benefit from it. UC Berkeley educates and trains California’s next generation of leaders. We cannot do that when only 2.7 percent of our undergraduates are African American and 10.5 percent are Chicano/Latino. We can neither achieve true excellence here at the University of California nor fulfill our public mission unless we access fully the entire talent pool. Our goal is to reverse this trend. Our strategy is to call attention to the situation, identify causes, research and test potential solutions, and serve as a resource for public policy makers as they struggle with this issue. Talking about it, raising people’s consciousness, saying from the top that this is something we care deeply about has attracted significant public interest. We strategically picked media outlets that command wide attention and engaged editorial writers sympathetic to our effort. The response has been even more positive than we might have hoped. It is clear that there is a wellspring of pent-up demand for new leadership on this issue. An alumnus from the class of 1979 wrote me: “My days at Cal were some of my happiest. I was a poor Mexican kid from the ghetto in Riverside. I had no idea what my education would do for me, but I knew I needed it. I have done postgrad work at MIT and am an urban planner in Boston. I know many doors were opened because of my Cal experience. I urge you in the strongest terms to remember the other poor kids of color all over California. They have so much to contribute, if only they are given the chance. We all lose when only some of the human capabilities that exist in California are nurtured. Keep up the excellence at Cal!” Bob Reyes. What are we doing beyond advocating publicly for inclusion? UC Berkeley is the world’s premier public research and teaching university, so we will play to our strengths. I am committing resources, including new faculty positions, so that we can lead research and educational efforts in the many facets of inclusion: the business ramifications of a multicultural workforce, racial and cultural health disparities, self-segregation as a norm, and more. In addition, we will analyze the effects of Proposition 209. As an experimental scientist, I believe that one must understand what the data is telling us. Voters in California hoped that Prop. 209 would foster nondiscrimination. The empirical evidence on this campus suggests that this experiment has failed. Our approach and spotlight will be scientific, not political. We will comply with the law while we investigate the long-term effects of Prop. 209. On campus, we applaud the increased activity in reaching out to underrepresented minority students who might want to apply to Cal, and the reenergized efforts to enroll minority students that are accepted. A number of private organizations and anonymous donors are providing the resources since Prop. 209 prevents us from spending public money that is targeted to specific ethnic/racial groups. This effort will take time. Periodically I will update you on our progress. Ultimately, this task is a fight for our soul as an institution. Inclusion is about leadership and excellence, principles that California and its leading public university, UC Berkeley, have long well modeled, and might again. |
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