Administrators continue to gather responses to 105 questions submitted last fall by the Office for Civil Rights needed to evaluate the University's five-year plan.

University officials expect to have a response ready by March.

Questions concentrate on programs developed to recruit and retain minority students, minority scholarship information and minority employee statistics.

The University developed its 1983 plan in response to a state desegregation mandate requiring Pennsylvania institutions of higher education to increase minority enrollment.

Although the first plan ended in 1988, the Office for Civil Rights must determine if the University made sufficient efforts to increase minority enrollment, said Paul Wood, a public affairs spokesman for the office. If the plan is not sufficient, the office will then make suggestions to improve efforts, he said.

Questions were submitted to aid the evaluation process, he said.

"It's not a reflection that the University has done something wrong," he added.

Federal funds could be withheld from the University if it is not in compliance with Title VI of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, said Greg Lozier, executive director of the office of planning and analysis.

The government has never withheld funds for not following the state's desegregation mandate when that mandate was in effect. Such sanctions are a last resort and would not be imposed unless an institution did not make attempts in good faith to improve a situation, Wood said.

"(Withholding funds) is our final recourse of action. That's our big stick," he said.

The Office for Civil Rights evaluates many institutions statewide, Wood added, and has requested additional information of others as well.

"It's fairly common," he said.

Some questions could be answered from existing files but other questions had to be sent to various colleges, said Minora Sharpe, assistant in the University's office of planning and analysis.

Representatives from the Office for Civil Rights visited the University in January 1988 during which representatives conducted private interviews with University faculty and staff, said James Stewart, head of the University's Equal Opportunity Planning Committee.

Because the interviews were confidential, he said he had no way of making sure the Office for Civil Rights received all necessary information, he said. The 105 questions request data to supplement that received in the interviews, he added.

As a result of these questions, University offices will now be better able to keep track of information for future external evaluations, said Stewart.

The Office for Civil Rights will probably suggest the University develop another plan, which it has already done, said Minora Sharpe, an assistant in the University's office of Planning and Analysis.

The University's goal, according to the plan, was to "create a student body more reflective of the racial mix of Pennsylvania's overall population." At that time, the University planned to increase the black student population to 5 percent of the total student population.

According to the plan, the University planned to improve black student recruitment, increase financial aid to prospective black students, develop support services for black students in non-academic areas, increase involvement of black alumni, and develop cooperation programs with Lincoln and Cheyney universities, among other things.

The EOPC was developed in 1983 to help implement some of the goals and programs outlined in the five-year plan.

The state mandate was overturned in 1988, but University President Bryce Jordan said then he would continue efforts to increase minority enrollment but refused to set a specific deadline for reaching this goal.

In 1988, before receiving the Office for Civil Right's questions, the University developed a three-year plan to continue the work of the five-year plan, Sharpe said.

Stewart said the new plan was designed primarily to evaluate programs started under the five-year plan.

Because it received the 1983 mandate late that spring, the University had only that summer to develop its five-year plan, Stewart said. Now they must look back and see how well that plan has worked, he added.

Although the questions arrived after this process began, Stewart said the University can still incorporate suggestions from that office.

"We're always looking for ideas from any source," he said.