DAYBREAK - Minority Medical School Enrollment Drops as UCSF Expands Outreach

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1st appeared 11 October 1999

Minority Medical School Enrollment Drops as UCSF Expands Outreach

Despite increased outreach efforts, enrollment of underrepresented minorities in the UCSF School of Medicine has dropped for the fourth consecutive year to this year’s 13.5 percent or 19 students in the first-year class, according to figures released Oct. 5 by the UC Office of the President.

equipment giveaway A total of 453 underrepresented minorities, a collective term for American Indian/Alaskan Natives, African-Americans, Mexican-American/Chicano, and Puerto Rican, applied to the UCSF School of Medicine this fall. And while 50 were admitted -- an increase of six offers from the previous year -- only 19 chose to attend.

This first-year class has the lowest number of underrepresented minorities in the medical school since 1969, the year the University implemented affirmative action programs, according to Michael Drake, associate dean of admissions for the School of Medicine.

Last year, UCSF offered admissions to 44 underrepresented minorities and 24 enrolled, accounting for 17 percent of the class.

"What’s different this year is that even though we made six more offers of admission [to underrepresented minorities], we’re minus five students," Drake says. "Not only do we have the fewest underrepresented minorities in 30 years, but we have the lowest acceptance rate that we have ever had."

"For whatever reasons, students have gone elsewhere and what we’ve seen is that they have not gone to other California medical schools," Drake says.

Medical students who reject UCSF report in exit surveys a variety of reasons why they choose to go elsewhere, such as better financial scholarships, but they often cite concerns with California politics in conversations, Drake notes.

In 1995, UCSF’s medical school received 731 applications from underrepresented minorities. That year an all-time high of 42 underrepresented minority medical students enrolled, representing 29.8 percent of the first-year class.

Of the 196 offers of admission to underrepresented medical students to UC’s five medical schools this year, only 63 actually enrolled. They represent 11.1 percent of UC’s 569 first-year medical students. The number of applications from underrepresented minorities to the medical schools at UC Davis, UC Irvine, UCLA, UC San Diego and UCSF also declined from a high of 3,258 in 1995 to 2,113 this year. The drop in applications and acceptances has prompted UC President Richard Atkinson to form a task force to investigate the issue.

internship program "We have to redouble our efforts to make everyone feel welcome," says Drake, who expects to serve on the minority enrollment task force. "It’s important for us to get the message out that achieving a diverse student body has always been a crucial component of our goal of overall excellence."

Kevin Grumbach, director of the UCSF Center for California Health Workforce Studies, issued a report in March documenting the decline in minority enrollment in California, where the magnitude of the reductions has been much greater than the nation overall. The report concluded that the UC Regents’ decision to abolish selective admissions policies for underrepresented minorities and the passage of Proposition 209 are likely to have contributed to the decline in their enrollment in California medical schools.

"Qualified minority students appear to be preferentially enrolling in medical schools outside of California that have not been forced to roll back their affirmative action programs," he says.

The enrollment trends go beyond the lost opportunities for the underrepresented students themselves, says Grumbach, UCSF professor and chief of family and community medicine at San Francisco General Hospital Medical Center. "African-American and Latino physicians are much more likely than other physicians to practice in low-income, minority communities -- communities that tend to have a shortage of physicians," he says.

The report recommended, among other things, that California reinstate selective admission policies for underrepresented minorities in California medical schools.

The UC Regents banned the consideration of race and gender in the selection process for admission to UC in July 1995. Proposition 209, approved by California voters in November 1996, prohibits the consideration of race and gender in state employment, education and contracting programs.

Says Dan Lowenstein, neurology professor and former co-chair of the Chancellor's Steering Committee on Diversity, "This latest news provides yet more evidence that the ‘chilling effect’ prophesized by many at the time of the Regents decision in 1995 has become a reality. We are witnessing the erosion of one of the most unique and prized aspects of UCSF -- our diversity. I think we need to redouble our efforts to reverse this trend at every level, including programs to identify and prepare talented students for careers in health sciences, actions during the admissions process that affirm the value of diversity, and an even stronger message from our campus community that we value and respect the differences among us."

The Regents established the UC Outreach Task Force in 1995 to identify ways to assure that the University remains accessible to students of diverse backgrounds. The developing task force recommends a four-point strategy, including school-centered partnerships, expanding of academic development programs, and implementing an aggressive informational outreach program to attract a diverse student body.

This year’s $2.7 billion UC budget provides $17 million in new funding for outreach programs and K-12 academic improvement initiatives and adds $1.5 million in new funding for UC outreach programs to prospective graduate and professional school students.

UCSF’s Outreach Update

At the UC Regents’ meeting last month, Chancellor Mike Bishop summed up the challenges in achieving diversity in a report about UCSF’s science education and outreach efforts.

"Although UCSF does not grant undergraduate degrees, we have a very strong stake in the quality of the early education for our future professional and graduate students. Thus, we are an enthusiastic partner in the Universitywide effort to promote student access to higher education at all levels," Bishop said. "But the specialized mission of UCSF also draws our attention to a particular problem: the decline in numbers of disadvantaged students who are choosing advanced education as health care professionals and biomedical scientists.

"The problem is even more severe in the case of biomedical research scientists. Each year, among the thousands of PhDs awarded in the relevant disciplines, there is only a handful of minority students, and in recent years, the number of applications from minorities to graduate school in these disciplines has become vanishingly small. UCSF has been among the pioneering forces in efforts to remedy these problems."

Attkisson, dean of Graduate Studies and associate vice chancellor for student academic affairs, says the University is expanding its outreach programs, which include after-school programs, summer enrichment, teacher professional development and graduate and professional outreach.

The Science & Health Education Partnership (SEP) is one of the best examples of UCSF’s efforts to improve the understanding of science and health college eligibility in the San Francisco Unified School District (SFUSD), where some 85 percent of the students are minorities. The brainchild of former UCSF professor Bruce Alberts, now president of the National Academy of Sciences, SEP kicked off its 13th season last week. A collaboration between UCSF and SFUSD, SEP brings together scientists, health clinicians and teachers in 80 percent of San Francisco schools. Among its various offerings, SEP conducts a summer internship program for local high school students who do real science and learn about science careers.

Besides reaching a broad audience of students, parents, teachers and school counselors at college fairs, career days and workshops, UCSF also hosts intensive educational programs for students at all levels. UCSF’s long-term goal is to reach 100 students at elementary, middle and high school levels, Attkisson says.

For example, this past summer, UCSF, under the direction of the School of Dentistry, launched the Health Science Enrichment Program, which brought 34 high school juniors and seniors to UCSF in an intensive six-week course that introduced them to health science careers. A partnership with local high schools and the University of San Francisco, which offered its classrooms for math and sciences lessons, the program also helped students select a college, write personal statements, develop study and verbal skills and build self-esteem.

UCSF also encourages disadvantaged college students toward pursuing health science careers through new post-baccalaureate programs in dentistry and medicine. All five students who participated in the inaugural Dental Post-Baccalaureate Program last year received offers of admission to dental school. The medical school began a similar program this year with 12 students and hopes to recruit 22 next year.

Evidence shows that the Graduate Division’s 15-year-old summer research training program also is achieving positive results. Of those students who participated in the programs from 1985 to 1999, 60 percent have gone on to graduate studies, according to Attkisson. Of this 60 percent, 29 percent pursued medical, dental or pharmacist degrees and 27 percent pursued PhDs.

UCSF is committed to evaluating each of its programs, Attkisson says, and is looking to extend outreach efforts to students in South San Francisco, Daly City and northern San Mateo County, intensify collaboration with other UC campuses and help develop a public school on the UCSF Mission Bay campus.

"We are proud of the entrepreneurial spirit that has marked our efforts in establishing outreach programs," Bishop told the Regents. "That spirit serves as the best evidence that our leadership, faculty and students are deeply and effectively committed to the cause of outreach."

Links:

Science and Health Education Partnership

UC data on fall 1999 medical school enrollments