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Living History Project

A Collective History of Student Engagement at UC Santa Barbara

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Student Response to Affirmative Action

1982
UCSB continues to have the lowest undergraduate Black student enrollment in the UC system: 2.1%.  The graduate program has 2% Black students, the second smallest percentage in the UC system.  UCSB Chancellor Robert Huttenback declares that "It's foolish for us to spend a lot of money trying to recruit Blacks...We can't even recruit uncoordinated Black athletes."

1986
A review of UCSB's progress in affirmative action by federal investigators specifies a problem area in the recruitment and retention of Black and Hispanic females in both faculty and managerial positions. 

June 20, 1995 
Affirmative Action, No More, UC Regents vote to end affirmative action in the UC system despite the protest of 1,000 students present.  Immediately upon returning to campus, students go to work protesting.  

October 12, 1995
400 UCSB students attend a demonstration at Storke Plaza to support the restoration of Affirmative Action.  

1996
The Heritage Foundation published Ward Connerly's essay titled With Liberty and Justice For All speaking against affirmative action. 

1998 
The year marking the 30th anniversary of the Department of Black Studies, UCSB participated in a UC-wide two-day walkout to protest anti-affirmative action legislation and a proposal by University of California Regent Ward Connerly to eliminate ethnic studies programs. 1,500 students marched to Cheadle Hall, 200 of whom took over the 5th floor, which included Chancellor Henry T. Yang’s office. 

The students present Yang with a list of nine demands and, although he does not have authority to implement some of them, he does publicly speak in support of the list and, at the next meeting of the UC Regents, of ethnic and gender studies programs. In addition, more classes are later offered in queer theory, and programs in Islamic and Near Eastern Studies and Jewish Studies are established in the Department of Global and International Studies.

October 19, 2000
UC Regent Ward Connerly was invited by UCSB Campus Republicans to speak at Isla Vista Theatre about the need for UC's to eliminate ethnic studies.  His invitation was met with many supporters of his message as well as large opposition from students and community members for his work in dismantling affirmative action in UC admissions.

March 13, 2013
The Associated Students Office of the President held Raise Your Voice! — a town hall meeting addressing diversity, representation and marginalization in the campus community — at Corwin Pavilion.  The event provided an open forum for students to address UCSB administration about university-wide policies regarding issues of sexual violence as well as retention and recruitment aimed at promoting diversity. The UC Campus Climate and Diversity survey study was presented, and the forum included a student panel as well as an administration panel and open space for student organizations to voice their requests regarding campus climate issues.

May 2013
The Associated Students Office of the President hosted a day of education focusing on issues of diversity at UCSB.  During the event at Corwin Pavilion students were able to address administrators as well as educate the campus community.  During the educational component students presented the history of affirmative action in the UC system titled A Call to Action.
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