Frontera NorteSur September-October 2003

Tijuana's UABC Tries to Place Rejected Applicants

Only 58% of applicants to the Autonomous University of Baja California (Universidad Autónoma de Baja California, UABC) in Tijuana were accepted to begin their studies in the fall of 2003. Of the 6,078 students that applied to the UABC, 2,578 were rejected, some of them for the second or third year in a row. Beginning next week, UABC administrators will formally begin trying to find a new for place students that were denied entrance to the program of their choice. 

Some students were turned away from the university because they scored less than 400 points on the admission exam, others because they had low grades in high school, and others because their major filled up with more qualified applicants. 

Lilliana Sánchez Segura, 19, one of the students that was not granted entrance into the UABC, told the Tijuana newspaper Frontera, "I spoke with Vice President, I told her that I scored 524 points on the entrance test, that it was the second time that I had applied to the communications program, that I had a 8.24 [of 10] in high school, that I had studied a lot, also that my second choice was to study psychology. She listened to me and told me that one possible alternative was for me to relocate to humanities, in a major like literature, history, philosophy or even tourism. She also suggested that I go to another university with a program similar to that of the UABC and that I later try to enter the university and transfer my credits."

Although the UABC had previously announced that from August 4 to August 8 it would move students into unfilled programs, on Thursday, July 18, administrators met with 250 students that hoped to get into the university. A spokesperson for the UABC stated that staff was meeting with these early arrivals and trying to explain available options to them. 

All hope is not lost for students like Sánchez that have yet to be admitted to the university. Students that have been accepted to the UABC but have not paid their tuition by August 3 will lose their places in the university. This will give some rejected students the opportunity to begin their college educations in the fall. 

Source: Frontera (Tijuana), July 29, 2003. Article by Omar Millán González.