In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

Reviewed by:
  • Entrepreneurial President: Richard Atkinson and the University of California, 1995–2003 by Patricia A. Pelfrey
  • Cristina Gonzalez
Patricia A. Pelfrey. Entrepreneurial President: Richard Atkinson and the University of California, 1995–2003. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2012. 250 pp. Cloth: $49.95. ISBN: 978-0-5202-7080-0.

The University of California has been blessed with a plethora of devoted members who have written about its accomplishments and its challenges. Aware of the importance of the institution as a distinct public research university whose development has been, and continues to be, of interest to people throughout the country and around the world, many faculty members and senior administrators have written books about it, from personal memoirs to historical accounts. Entrepreneurial President is an example of the latter.

Patricia Pelfrey is a high-level staff member who had a successful career as a writer and analyst for five UC presidents—Charles Hitch, David Saxon, David Gardner, Jack Peltason, and Richard Atkinson. With a Ph.D. in English from UC Berkeley, Pelfrey was well equipped for the job, at which she excelled, becoming a resident university historian of sorts. Fortunately for us, in 2004, after her retirement, she decided to share her knowledge with a broader audience and published a short but pithy book titled A Brief History of the University of California. This volume has been very helpful in my own research, and I am delighted that Pelfrey has now taken a further step and produced this in-depth study of the Atkinson presidency.

As Karl Pister indicates in the book’s Foreword, Pelfrey’s 32 years as a staff member afforded her “both a level and a breadth of understanding of everyday life in the Office of the President (UCOP) that few if any possess” (p. viii). In spite of her personal involvement in the events she narrates, Pelfrey was able to look back and analyze Atkinson’s tenure as president with a remarkable degree of objectivity. This book provides a wealth of important observations about the most salient aspects of the Atkinson presidency, namely the struggle to minimize the problems caused by the elimination of affirmative action at the university and in other state-controlled institutions, the increased emphasis on the university’s role as a motor of the economy, and the changing terms of the university’s oversight of federal laboratories. Her choice of topics is in itself an interpretation of the Atkinson presidency, which as he indicated, started and ended during “tumultuous times” (p. 156).

The affirmative action crisis was the biggest challenge in the entire Atkinson presidency, which began shortly after the passage of Special Policies 1 and 2 (SP1, SP2) and Proposition 209, prohibiting consideration of race and gender in the admissions and hiring processes at California’s public institutions. Pelfrey explains the chain of events that led to this development as well as its consequences for the university and for Atkinson, who found himself in the middle of a very heated debate the moment he became president.

In addition to providing new information about Atkinson’s attempt to delay the elimination of affirmative action, which almost cost him his job, Pelfrey spends a great deal of time reviewing his initiatives to mitigate the damage caused by SP1, SP2, and Proposition 209. They include the expansion of outreach programs designed to prepare underprivileged students to enter the university and the reexamination of the conditions for admission. For example, Atkinson established a plan to accept the top 4% of students at all high schools across the state, which afforded students in the poorest schools opportunities they would not have had otherwise. [End Page 416]

In addition, relying on his experience and prestige as a psychologist, Atkinson questioned publicly the validity of some standardized tests in which minority students did not perform well. This challenge caused a media sensation. Fearing that the University of California system would stop requiring the SAT for admissions, the Educational Testing Service had to revise this test to make it less culturally biased. Most importantly, Atkinson adopted a more inclusive definition of merit and pushed for comprehensive review of applications—that is, a holistic approach to evaluating the overall strength...

pdf

Share