LSU President F. King Alexander is defending the university’s decision to use a holistic admission standards, in the wake of reports that 7.5 percent of the freshman class did not meet traditional GPA or ACT requirements. On Talk Louisiana with Jim Engster, Alexander said sometimes scores don’t tell the full story about a prospective student’s aptitude.

“Take a closer look at who these students are and what they have been through. Did they lose their homes in Denham Springs and Livingston Parish, did they lose their high schools? That may have impacted their junior year.”

Previously the Board of Regents allowed for four percent of students to fall below the 3.0 GPA and 22 ACT requirement.

Alexander says the process benefits not only those who’ve had family hardship, but also out of state students who excelled academically, but did not have a high school curriculum that included all of the classes necessary to attend LSU.

“Most of those students are not going to go through an appeals process because they have offers from other universities in other states and the likelihood of ever getting them to Louisiana vanishes immediately.”

All but three SEC schools use the holistic approach, those schools being Bama, Arkansas, and Ole Miss, who is about to change to the policy in the near the future. Alexander says while the new policy will help high out of state achievers make it to Baton Rouge, it won’t keep out locals.

“Were not sacrificing in state students for out of state students. Were 78 percent in state and we have room to take both our in state students that can succeed as well as those from out of state.”

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