The Seventies Under Simpson

For the first five years, Simpson concentrated on helping the University System cope with the booming enrollments of the Sixties. But as the decade passed into the 1970s, the task of managing the System became more formidable. Soon the enrollment and building explosions ceased, and the board and the chancellor found themselves working to continually upgrade a network of colleges and universities growing at a steady, if slower, pace.

This meant changes in the System. Some of them were academic, such as the Rising Junior Test policy (later named the Regents Exam) approved in November 1972; it tested sophomores on reading and writing skills. Others were more structural, such as an agreement with the state board for Vocational Education that provided vocational education at some public junior colleges.

None of the changes, however, was as sweeping as the movement to desegregate the University System. Although it had been 10 years since the University of Georgia took the first steps toward integration, more had to be done. As of 1974, almost half of the 12,500 black students in the System still were attending the three traditional black institutions - Savannah State, Albany State and Fort Valley State. In a process that involved the federal courts and the U.S. government, the Board of Regents worked to develop a policy that provided for the fair accommodation of all students.

The movement to accelerate desegregation can be traced to 1970, when the Office of Civil Rights (OCR) notified Chancellor Simpson of a need to "improve efforts of eliminating patterns of segregation." In his reply to OCR, the chancellor noted that some improvements had been made - indeed, minority faculty had increased eight-fold in five years - but that the priorities in the Sixties had been controlling and managing the enormous growth.

As enrollment and building growth in the System settled down in the early Seventies, more attention was given to desegregation. Within a period of five days in 1973, the board was directed by two different authorities to come up with specific strategies for integration. The first came on March 22, when U.S. District Court Judge Wilbur D. Owens ordered the regents to submit a suitable integration plan for all-black Fort Valley State College. His directive came on the heels of a lawsuit filed by 29 parents of white students in the Fort Valley area, who charged college administrators and the board with failing to preserve racial equality and high academic standards at the institution.

The second order came March 27 from the U.S. Department of Health, Education and Welfare and, like the first, was borne out of a litigation. In 1970, a suit was filed against HEW to bring about desegregation. Though Georgia was not named specifically in the suit, HEW officials felt revisions needed to be made in the state's policy.