Report by Klitgaard Nears Completion

A report whose preliminary draft sparked protests on campus last fall because of its suggestion that admissions test scores overpredict the performance of some Black and woman students is now "all done" and will be circulated among academic deans within several months.

Robert E. Klitgaard '68, special assistant to President Bok and author of the admissions study, said yesterday the 300-page final draft is "perfectly innocuous," but declined to comment on whether it contains the controversial section on the later performance of minority and women students.

That section suggested that affirmative action programs may have undesirable results at universities like Harvard by creating a student body where Black students tend to receive lower grades than whites. Klitgaard emphasized then that the 55-page preliminary version represented only his ideas and did not make any policy recommendations.

No Surprise

But a source familiar with earlier drafts of the report who declined to be identified said yesterday that "it wouldn't surprise me if the controversial material was deleted in this final version."

Klitgaard said that only he and Bok--who commissioned the admissions study--have seen the final draft, but added he will show the completed report to "a couple of others" for "technical review" next month once he polishes off sections on the report's statistical procedures.

Bok was unavailable for comment yesterday.

The report, which Klitgaard will then present to academic deans, continues to include sections on "the pros and cons" of various admissions procedures, like alumni interviews, Klitgaard said. He added it makes no policy recommendations on any of the procedures.

Saying he is "not sure it'll be made public," Klitgaard stressed that the report remains "a briefing document" intended "not to say what we ought to do... but to point out the facts."

Because "the president has virtually no power in admitting students," Klitgaard said the impact of the report will hinge on the deans' reactions to it.

He declined to discuss "the substance" of the report, saying, "the deans don't even know what it's about."

Klitgaard, who originally expected the final report to be complete by early last winter, said the delay has come in part because "I keep giving these drafts to President Bok and he keeps sending them back."

But he stressed that his "rewriting and rewriting" has focused on making the briefing document "more readable and practical," adding that he has moved much statistical analysis to the report's appendix to make sure his discussion of the "pros and cons of various alternatives" is "provocative."