What do college applicants think about race in college-admission decisions?

We asked several area high-school graduates who applied for this fall's University of Washington freshman class. We chose the UW because it's the school that most consistently considers race in undergraduate admissions.

He made it on academics

Brannon Orton is bothered when people assume he got into the University of Washington because he's half Caucasian and half Hispanic. Even friends who know better joke about it.

Orton made it on academics - a 1,100 SAT score and a 3.9 GPA from West Seattle High School.

He knows some people are "kind of bitter" about affirmative action. And, he agrees: "Sometimes, it's not fair."

It blows him away that so many students of color complain there aren't any opportunities, when he says the opportunities are everywhere, including scholarships just for students of color.

Orton is ambivalent about I-200. On one hand, he says, race shouldn't be a factor. He knows a lot of minority kids who've done very well despite the fact that they come from a poorer family, and he expects that they will do well in college, also.

He says it's proven that kids who come from wealthier families do better in school. His mother, for example, grew up poor and lived at home with 11 brothers and sisters while she went to college. It was quite a challenge.

Maybe using race as a factor in admissions is worth keeping for disadvantaged students. Then again, he says, people can always go to community college.

Didn't check race box

Auburn Scallon, another graduate of West Seattle High School who is attending the UW this fall, did not check a race box on her application.

Caucasian and one-sixteenth Native American, she wanted admissions officials "to look at my grades instead of my race . . . because I don't think that has a lot to do with who I am."

She's ambivalent about the use of race in admission decisions.

"It's a good idea because a lot of people are discriminated against. We almost have to have it until we have a more perfect society."

But, she says, it's "kind of going in the wrong direction . . . overcompensating."

Decided not to appeal

When Nora Laughlin was denied admission to the UW, she thought about appealing, but decided it would be more of a hassle than it was worth.

"I also decided I wanted to go to community college for financial reasons," she says.

Laughlin will split the cost of tuition with her parents. Between working to earn money for college and participating in sports, she feels she couldn't have done more.

"I was pretty well maxed out."

UW admissions officials say her grades and test scores - a 3.34 GPA and 1,110 SAT - weren't high enough to earn her automatic acceptance, but were high enough to merit consideration for admission in a UW review that evaluates other factors, including extracurricular activities and race. She would have earned enough points in that process to be admitted if she was a minority.

The Blanchet High School graduate takes her denial in stride, in part because of an ethics and social-justice class in high school. What she concludes is that "it's necessary for our society . . . for the school . . . to reflect the city of Seattle and state of Washington."

Other factors considered

Celene Hernandez's grades and test scores weren't quite high enough by themselves to win her admission to the the UW this fall, but she still got in.

Ironically, while the eldest daughter of migrant farm workers received a boost for being Hispanic, she got in on the strength of other considerations, which won't be affected by passage of I-200 - surmounting personal hardship, being the first in her family to attend college and growing up poor.

Hernandez, however, feels some kind of affirmative action is needed because it's hard for students like her to compete academically with students "who don't have to work and who don't have to take care of their siblings and don't have as many responsibilities."

Hernandez's family moved to Wapato, Yakima County, from Mexico when she was a child. Each day, during her senior year at White Swan High School on the Yakama Indian Reservation, she rose before dawn to help her parents earn money in the fields, attended classes and then finished with a full shift as a store clerk.

This summer, Hernandez participated in a health-sciences program at the UW to help disadvantaged youth get a jump on college.

As she sees it, a degree from the UW will do no less than change her life. "This means I will have a career instead of having a job doing something I really don't like."

Some `have a head start'

The University of Washington offered Blanchet High School graduate Maya Perkins a spot not because of race - she's a blend of African American and white - or because of her academics, which didn't qualify her automatically but did meet minimum standards.

What tipped things in her favor was the credit she racked up for outstanding leadership skills, extracurricular activities, musical talent and experience with cultural diversity.

A short list: dancer for 11 years with the Pacific Northwest Ballet, page for the House of Representatives in Olympia, soloist in a jazz competition, contestant in international cheerleading, founder of a gospel choir.

In the end, Perkins decided to attend Howard University, a historically black institution on the East Coast.

She believes in a boost up for minorities because it will help people get to the same level as others who, "just because of their race or their position in society, already have a head start."