The Pursuit of Knowledge: Speeches and Papers of Richard C. Atkinson

Foreword by David S. Saxon

FOREWORD There are two ways of judging the accomplishments of university presidents: by the battles they have won and the battles they have fought. The battles won are reflected in such bottom-line measures as the size of the institutional budget and the distinction of the faculty. From this vantage point, Richard Atkinson’s tenure as president of the University of California was rich in victories. But understanding the ideas and ideals of a particular presidency requires a far broader perspective—a sense of the battles a president has faced as well as the battles that have been won. These live on in a president’s public speeches and papers. As this volume makes clear, President Atkinson fought on behalf of many causes crucial to the University during his eight-year administration . Let me mention two of truly major significance. The first is the enduring conundrum of race and affirmative action. No other issue in American life presents as challenging a combination of democratic idealism, conflicting views, and persistent pressures from across the political spectrum. Every ix U.C. president since Clark Kerr (1958–67) has had to struggle with the educational and demographic imperative of including within the University more members of traditionally excluded groups. Richard Atkinson was the first who had to address it without the advantage of admissions programs and policies that explicitly recognize race and its profound implications for access to education. He inherited the leadership of the University just weeks after it had become the nation’s first institution of higher education to ban the use of race and ethnicity as factors in admissions and hiring. The question of race is still with us; it remains the intractable problem of our time. But President Atkinson made a major contribution to California and U.C. by accomplishing what had to be done—moving the University into a radically different world of race-neutral policies and practices—without sacri- ficing either the University’s commitment to all the students of this state or its dedication to high academic standards. It was a difficult process that would have been even more difficult without his leadership. AffirmativeactionwasaninescapablechallengefortheAtkinson presidency. The use and misuse of standardized admissions tests—the second major issue President Atkinson confronted— was not. By 2001, American higher education’s reliance on the SAT I aptitude test had gone effectively unchallenged for seventy -five years, even though no one has ever proved that aptitude tests actually measure innate abilities, or that so complex a phenomenon as intelligence can be captured in a single number. A national debate about the limits and possibilities of standardized testing, and especially the claims of the SAT I, was urgently needed and long overdue. President Atkinson’s announcement x / Foreword in February 2001 that he was recommending elimination of the SAT I as a requirement for admission to U.C. galvanized that indispensable debate. As president of a great public university that was also the country’s largest user of the SAT I, President Atkinson had the institutional influence to focus national attention on the issue. As a distinguished cognitive scientist, he had the professional credentials to make a compelling case for reform. And—not least—he had the courage to take on a large and controversial issue that, despite its deep importance, had suffered from decades of neglect. His insistence that standardized tests must be carefully designed and thoughtfully employed has had a nationwide impact. This record of the Atkinson presidency serves as an introduction to eight eventful years in the life of the University and American higher education. It is also an introduction to the president himself—his remarkable energy, his perennially youthful enthusiasm, and his firm vision of what a research university ought to be. I am pleased to have played a role in persuading him to accept the chancellorship of U.C. San Diego in 1980. The rest is history—and a matter of great good fortune for the University of California. David S. Saxon President Emeritus University of California Foreword / xi ...