WEEKLY EDITORIAL RECAP

Tuesday

Don't delay tougher standards

Try as the Board of Regents might to improve the quality of scholarship at the state's undistinguished public universities, its members apparently will have to spend part of their August meeting in Reno beating back the bigotry of low expectations yet again. Less than a year after regents decided against delaying tougher admission standards at UNLV and UNR, Northern Nevada activists are still agitating to let middling high school graduates enter doctorate-granting institutions.

Come August, incoming university freshmen must have a minimum high school grade-point average of 3.0. The current minimum GPA of 2.75 took effect in 2006 over the shrill cries of defeatists who maintained the longstanding, embarrassingly low threshold of 2.5 was difficult enough. ...

"What we are opposing is a higher GPA requirement in the absence of comprehensive programs to avoid disproportional impacts on minority and low-income students," said ACLU of Nevada President Richard Siegel.

Perhaps Mr. Siegel hasn't heard of a "comprehensive program" called public education. Taxpayers spend a few billion dollars on it each year. ...

The university system already has established a series of admission exemptions for high school graduates with low GPAs, including one for overcoming "hardships." Demanding better high school marks in an age of rampant grade inflation isn't denying anyone access to higher education. ...

The Board of Regents must resist this politically correct pressure and stick to its guns. The university system and the state will be better off if this year's higher admission standards are left alone.