[CBW_Exec] Fwd: response to "UC Admissions Changes Align with StateStrategic Higher Education Plan."

Fri Aug 14 10:29:12 CDT 2009

Susan, let me add my thanks. What I especially like is the way you
muster the research on this topic to show the wrongheadedness of the UC
policy; hope you don't mind if we quote your letter, as well as your
sources, when any of us have to make the argument for basic writers at
the whole range of higher education institutions.

Bill

Professor of English
Director, Composition Program
Director, Global Development Collaborative,
          Office of Sponsored Research and Faculty Development
West Chester University
West Chester, PA 19383-2124
(v)610.436.2268; (f)610.738.0516; wlalicker at wcupa.edu

-----Original Message-----
From: Deborah Mutnick [mailto:Deborah.Mutnick at liu.edu] 
Sent: Friday, August 14, 2009 10:36 AM
To: Conference of Basic Writing Executive Board; Aaron M. Kerley; Amy
Winans; Ann Green; Sonya Armstrong; Pip Brougham II; buzzmonkee; Shannon
Carter; Pete Johnson; Barbara Gleason; deborah sanchez; Debbie
Sternecky; Jennifer Kwon Dobbs; Conference of Basic Writing Executive
Board; Mast, Eric (mastea); Paulson, Eric (paulsoe); Jonathan Alexander;
Lalicker, William ; Rebecca Mlynarczyk; MPRaupach at aol.com; Holley,
Michelle (holleyma); claudine.debray at uc.edu
Subject: RE: [CBW_Exec] Fwd: response to "UC Admissions Changes Align
with StateStrategic Higher Education Plan."

Susan,

The letter is terrific. Thanks for forwarding it to us. I hope it
reaches a wider audience, particularly at UC.

All the best,
Deborah

Deborah Mutnick, Director of Writing
English Department
1 University Plaza
Long Island University
Brooklyn, NY 11201
718-488-1110

________________________________

From: cbw_exec-bounces at tamu-commerce.edu on behalf of Susan Bernstein
Sent: Thu 8/13/2009 2:53 PM
To: Aaron M. Kerley; Amy Winans; Ann Green; Sonya Armstrong; Pip
Brougham II; buzzmonkee; Shannon Carter; Pete Johnson; Barbara Gleason;
deborah sanchez; Debbie Sternecky; Deborah Mutnick; Jennifer Kwon Dobbs;
Conference of Basic Writing Executive Board; Mast, Eric (mastea);
Paulson, Eric (paulsoe); Jonathan Alexander; Lalicker, William; Rebecca
Mlynarczyk; MPRaupach at aol.com; Holley, Michelle (holleyma);
claudine.debray at uc.edu
Subject: [CBW_Exec] Fwd: response to "UC Admissions Changes Align with
StateStrategic Higher Education Plan."

Dear Friends,

As many of you know, the Center for Access and Transition, the
University of Cincinnati Program where I taught from 2004-2007, will be
eliminated as of summer 2010.  Following is the letter I sent to the
University.

Best regards,

Susan Naomi Bernstein

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Susan Bernstein <susan.naomi at gmail.com>
Date: Thu, Aug 13, 2009 at 2:33 PM
Subject: response to "UC Admissions Changes Align with State Strategic
Higher Education Plan."
To: greg.hand at uc.edu
Cc: susan.stringer at uc.edu, jean.griffin at uc.edu,
lillian.santa-maria at uc.edu, marianne.kunnen-jones at uc.edu,
letters at citybeat.com, tcallinan at enquirer.com,
chief.newsrecord at gmail.com, newsrecordnews at gmail.com,
opinion.newsrecord at gmail.com, letters at dispatch.com

Greg Hand
University of Cincinnati
2600 Clifton Ave
Cincinnati OH 45221
(0141) EDWARDS 2 3356
Government Relations & University Communications
Assoc Vice President
University Spokesperson
greg.hand at uc.edu 

Dear Mr. Hand,

I write in response to your article of 8/7/09 "UC Admissions Changes
Align with State Strategic Higher Education Plan."(1) The demise of the
Center for Access and Transition (CAT), one of the most significant
changes, is buried in paragraph five. This change is attributed to the
state law that eliminates funding for developmental education programs
at Ohio's major public universities.  Most of these taxpayer-funded
universities are located in economically distressed urban and rural
communities with struggling public K-12 school systems.   The article
fails to mention this fact; the article also fails to mention that 37%
of the students who began their education at the Center for Access and
Transition in 2007-08 were African-American.(2) 

According to a Diversity Task Force report on Fall 2006 enrollments, the
CAT was described as having a potentially positive impact on providing
access to and increasing the enrollment of students of color.(3) However
with the elimination of the CAT, that agenda seems to have effectively
ended.  Instead, under-financed and educationally stigmatized
institutions like Cincinnati State will carry a heavier load.  UC, which
benefits from revenues from all tax-paying citizens of Cincinnati, will
now bar access to students who would most benefit from its plentiful
resources.

In your article Caroline Miller, senior associate vice president for
enrollment management, states that after five years, UC has made the
following "discovery": "It appears strength of high school, living on
campus, motivation/enthusiasm for college and UC and support from
athletics are positive contributing factors."(4) I find it worrisome
that it took UC five years to make a "discovery" that educational
researchers have been studying for several decades.  

The findings of Attewell and Lavin's award-winning study(5), for
instance, suggest that with sufficient time and support students who do
not fit into Miller's description can in fact succeed in a four-year
university environment and can improve their economic situation in ways
that have lasting positive impacts on their children and grandchildren.
It is distressing that UC (and indeed Governor Strickland and the Ohio
State Legislature) did not take this evidence into consideration when it
made the decision to deny access to students who did not have the
privilege of attending strong high schools. 

UC's decision to eliminate the Center for Access and Transition seems
even more tragic in these times of great economic difficulty for the
state of Ohio and the city of Cincinnati and the surrounding region.  In
its early years, the CAT boasted higher enrollments and a robust sense
of optimism. I know because I was a full-time, tenure-track assistant
professor at the CAT from 2004 to 2007. I have studied the benefits of
developmental education for more than twenty years; in 2008 I published
an article about the CAT that documented the improvements made by
students in a beginning developmental writing course over a short
ten-week quarter time period.(6) In the early years of CAT, faculty had
access to more support for research, with the caveat that our research
would directly benefit CAT students.  However, by the spring of 2007, it
was clear that CAT was on the chopping block.  Funding for vital student
support services, including research support, has greatly diminished in
the years since.  Research faculty, myself included, left the CAT when
we understood that our students and our program were not a funding
priority for UC.
The "admissions changes" that you outline in your article have real life
consequences for Cincinnati students and their families who cannot
afford housing in districts with "strong" public schools and who do not
have the funds for private education. I understand that UC must be
accountable to legislators and other stakeholders in the state of Ohio
and beyond. It seems, however, that we almost never are accountable to
the students, and to the young people who we leave drowning in the wreck
of access denied.

Thank you for your kind consideration of my letter.

Sincerely, 

Susan Naomi Bernstein, PhD

75-23 113th St. #1J
Forest Hills, NY 11375
susan.naomi at gmail.com

Notes
1.     Hand, Greg. "UC Admissions Changes Align with State Strategic
Higher Education Plan." University of Cincinnati News. 7 August 2009.
http://www.uc.edu/news/NR.aspx?id=10500
2.    University of Cincinnati Fact Book, Autumn 2008.
http://www.uc.edu/institutionalresearch/report.htm 
3.     Recruitment and Retention Subcommittee Task Force Diversity Task
Force. http://www.uc.edu/diversitytaskforce/documents/appendix_I.pdf  
4.     Hand, Greg. "UC Admissions Changes Align with State Strategic
Higher Education Plan." University of Cincinnati News. 7 August 2009.
http://www.uc.edu/news/NR.aspx?id=10500 
5.     Paul Attewell, David E. Lavin, Thurston Domina, and Tania Levey.
Passing the Torch:Does Higher Education for the Disadvantaged Pay off
Across the Generations?    New York: Russell Sage Foundation, 2007.
Print.
6.     Bernstein, Susan Naomi. "Material Realities in the Basic Writing
Classroom: Intersections of Discovery for Young Women Reading Persepolis
2." Journal of Basic Writing 27.1 (2008). 80-104. Print.