The roll of Californians who rose from modest circumstances to enrich our lives and our society after receiving a taxpayer-supported education at the University of California — or Cal State or the community college system — is too long to enumerate here. They’re scientists who made world-altering discoveries, literary artists, composers and musicians, political leaders of city, state and country. But the recent trend in state support of public higher education raises a question germane to the careers of Warren and Kingston and all those others: If they graduated from high school today, would they have any chance of getting a UC education? … So here’s a radical proposal: As tuition increases threaten to place a UC education out of the reach of working-class and middle-class students, let’s reinvigorate the notion of a free UC education. The chief objection to this idea isn’t hard to predict: “We can’t afford it!” Yet it’s odd how eliminating in-state tuition is regarded today as completely out of the bounds of good sense, while proposals with far greater fiscal impact are floated routinely and given sober consideration.
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by Michael Hiltzik, The Los Angeles Times.
Posted: April 11th, 2012, by: admin. Categories: . Awaiting Comments.
“Framing this as a debate over how ‘patient’ the University is, happens to be a convenient rhetorical strategy for the university, because it presupposes the activists’ guilt,” he told the Vanguard. “It makes it seem as though the blockade spontaneously arose out of a vacuum rather than being a justified reaction to a predatory deal between US Bank and the Regents. The University is using the charges to prepare its case against a possible attempt by the bank to hold the university liable for the bank’s departure,” he said. Mr. Raskin calls this “a frivolous charge, of course, since the contract explicitly states that the bank is responsible for its own security,” adding, “The bank accused the university of being too soft on the blockade, so the university urgently needs to ruin a dozen lives to dispel any suspicions of leniency.” Mr. Shiller noted that, while both sides have threatened each other with lawsuits, neither has filed suit. Moreover, he said, “Talks continue with U.S. Bank on the future of the partnership.” At the same time, other banks have expressed an interest to step in.
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by David M. Greenwald, The Davis Vanguard.
Posted: March 31st, 2012, by: admin. Categories: . Awaiting Comments.
Several state lawmakers are pushing for a tougher crackdown on California State University executive compensation in the wake of trustees’ decision to approve the maximum allowable pay raises for new campus presidents. CSU trustees in January approved a new executive compensation policy [PDF] that caps the amount of base pay new campus presidents can earn at no more than 10 percent above their predecessors’ pay. In the first application of the new policy, trustees last week signed off on full 10 percent pay raises for two new presidents at CSU East Bay and CSU Fullerton. The move came as CSU officials announced that they would limit spring admissions to all but a few hundred students due to state budget cuts, shutting out tens of thousands of would-be college-goers. If Gov. Jerry Brown’s proposed tax measure fails, the system also might deny admission to up to 25,000 qualified applicants in fall 2013.
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by Erica Perez, California Watch.
Posted: March 26th, 2012, by: admin. Categories: . Awaiting Comments.
The universities are having to do things they don’t want to do precisely because the legislature isn’t providing them money. This lack of public support is not merely the fault of the legislature. The budget system itself — a system constructed by both parties, the legislature, interest groups and the voters themselves — guarantees constant cuts in public support to universities. If the legislature wants to help universities cope with this never-ending budget crisis, great. But using the universities as whipping posts is unhelpful and wrong. Particularly when the governor and legislative leadership refuse to tackle the hard work of redesigning the budget and governing systems so that the universities don’t get hammered all the time. So here’s some advice for Sen. Steinberg, Gov. Brown and the meddling legislators. Get to work on fixing the budget system. And until you do that, when it comes to public universities, butt out.
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by Joe Matthews, NBC Bay Area.
Posted: March 25th, 2012, by: admin. Categories: . Awaiting Comments.
Prospective students understand that UC Berkeley opens the doors of opportunity and transforms lives. They also know that the university welcomes talented students from all ethnic, racial and socioeconomic backgrounds. Diminished state funding is surely lamentable, but it is just part of the equation. For a more complete picture, consider some other important numbers: In 1960 almost all UC Berkeley undergraduates were middle or upper-middle class. In 2010, 34 percent were Pell Grant recipients, meaning they came from households with annual incomes below $45,000. We have more Pell grant students than all eight Ivy League universities combined… In 1960, more than half of Berkeley undergrads were white males. In 2010 this group represents only 15 percent of the undergraduates. In 1960, 90 percent of Berkeley’s undergrads came from families where both parents were born in the United States. In 2010, more than 60 percent of UC Berkeley’s undergraduates came from families where both parents were born outside the U.S.
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by Robert Haas and Richard Lyons, The Contra Costa Times.
Posted: March 24th, 2012, by: admin. Categories: . Awaiting Comments.
The University of California is violating state law by refusing to release portions of an investigative report on a police officer’s pepper-spraying of Occupy protesters, public-records experts said Wednesday. An Alameda County judge ruled this week that the university could release all but a few sections of the report to the public. But UC lawyers refused to release the document to this newspaper, which had requested it under the California Public Records Act. The state law requires public agencies such as the UC to provide most documents upon request. The university provided two disparate explanations for the denial, each of which open-government advocates criticized.
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by Matt Krupnick, The Contra Costa Times.
Posted: March 22nd, 2012, by: admin. Categories: . Awaiting Comments.
[T]he CFA presents a devastating critique of the “for-profit” direction that Chancellor Charles Reed and the Board of Trustees have taken the CSU system. “Leveraging the public’s hunger for ‘access’ and the opportunistic moment of crisis,” the paper’s summary states, “the CSU’s executive leadership is quietly pursuing a vision of the university that will have permanent consequences and irrevocably harm the CSU’s quality and reputation.” The detailed and densely footnoted report takes on the gigantic executive salaries and perks that have become central to the Chancellor and Trustees’ approach to university governance even in a period of austerity. The paper also critically examines the top management’s proposed expansion of Extended Education programs to by-pass public accountability as well as its promoting of on-line courses that can be farmed out to organizations outside the university in an effort to open up new opportunities to exploit California’s struggling student population.
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by Joseph A. Palermo, The Huffington Post.
Posted: March 22nd, 2012, by: admin. Categories: . Awaiting Comments.
California’s dismantling of its higher education system grows more alarming by the day. At this rate, it will take a generation for California to recover a higher education system that even meets its needs to compete in the global economy, let alone return to the world pre-eminence it once enjoyed. The latest blow that arrived this week was the decision by the California State University system to freeze admissions — and thus enrollment — for the spring 2013 semester… it is clear that the state of California has made a commitment to sacrifice higher education for other priorities, including a corrupt and bloated correctional system, a redundant bureaucracy and a self-protecting social-services delivery system filled with corruption and waste.
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by The Editors, The Visalia Times-Delta.
Posted: March 20th, 2012, by: admin. Categories: . Awaiting Comments.
From the beginning of the recession, in the 2007-8 fiscal year, through the 2011 fiscal year, college enrollment increased nationally by 12.5 percent, to 11.5 million students, the report says. But state and local appropriations have decreased by $1.3-billion over the same period… States and institutions alike should work to reverse the trends of decreasing government support and increasing costs to students, the report concludes in a commentary section. Otherwise, it says, the economic future of the United States will be at risk. “Other countries are rapidly improving the postsecondary education of their citizens; if the United States falls behind in either quality or the number of students who enroll and graduate, it will not be easy to catch up,” George Pernsteiner, chair of SHEEO’s executive committee and chancellor of the Oregon University System, said in a written statement accompanying the report.
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by Eric Kelderman, The Chronicle of Higher Education.
Posted: March 16th, 2012, by: admin. Categories: . Awaiting Comments.
Alex Barnard was one of many UC Berkeley students who visited the campus’ Tang Health Center after a violent Occupy Cal protest last Nov. 9. He arrived at Tang with contusions and broken ribs caused when an officer rammed him with her baton as hundreds of students linked arms to protect tents they had erected on campus. As with all violent injuries, from black eye to murder, state law requires medical centers to tell police. “The doctor said, ‘You know I have to report this to the UC police,’ ” said Bernard, a graduate student in sociology. “I just started crying at that point, realizing that the people who hurt me are supposed to investigate the beating and make it right. It’s Orwellian.”
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by Nanette Asimov, The San Francisco Chronicle.
Posted: March 16th, 2012, by: admin. Categories: . Awaiting Comments.
