Faced with a state budget crisis, the University of California system on Thursday began examining a possible tuition increase up to 16% in fall 2012 and continuing that increase over the following three years, nearly doubling tuition, if state funding is flat… The regents discussed potential four-year scenarios Thursday and decided to report back to the chairman in 10 days about alternatives to tuition hikes, said Dianne Klein, spokeswoman for UC President Mark Yudof. Those ideas, broached in Thursday’s meeting in San Francisco, include holding a ballot initiative to raise taxes, raising revenue from the private sector for scholarships, organizing a public service campaign financed by Google or another firm about the UC system’s contribution to the state, and working with state lawmakers on securing more public funding, Klein said.

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by Michael Martinez, CNN.

Posted: September 15th, 2011, by: admin. Categories: . Awaiting Comments.

The University of California has another option available to address these chronic funding problems. It could take the issue to voters with a ballot initiative that would give constitutional protection to some level of higher-ed funding. Guarantees are already in place for K-12 education and state prisons. Ballot-box budgeting has consequences, but no other state program has the same ability to grow the economy and restore our former stature in innovation and entrepreneurial spirit. An initiative appears to be the only option left to keep our public universities affordable for California’s battered middle class.

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by The Editors, The Bakersfield Californian.

Posted: September 15th, 2011, by: admin. Categories: . Awaiting Comments.

As the United States tries to recover from a recession, a new report by the Education Policy Center at the University of Alabama paints a dreary picture of the aftermath: Students are taking on more debt to pay for college, and community colleges are unable to meet the expanded need to retrain workers. And the future doesn’t look any sunnier. The report predicts cuts to state operating budgets at community colleges, public regional universities, and public flagship universities. Tuition will increase across all higher-education sectors and state-financed student aid will continue to dwindle or remain flat.

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by Jennifer Gonzalez, The Chronicle of Higher Education.

Posted: September 15th, 2011, by: admin. Categories: . Awaiting Comments.

Chief Executive Officer Ann Madden Rice was granted a raise of nearly $259,000, bringing her compensation to $960,000 a year. UC officials said Rice was being recruited by another academic hospital that was offering her a salary of $1.5 million. The raise UC is giving her is contingent on Rice withdrawing her application from the other hospital. Vice Chancellor Claire Pomeroy was given a raise of nearly $27,000, bringing her compensation to $664,275… Their raises were among about a dozen compensation items the regents approved, including raises for medical executives at the Irvine, Los Angeles, San Francisco campuses and managers of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. They also approved bonuses for Marie Berggren, UC’s Chief Investment Officer, and Jack Stobo, UC’s senior vice president of health sciences and services. None of those positions are paid with state funds.

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by Laurel Rosenhall, The Sacramento Bee.

Posted: September 15th, 2011, by: admin. Categories: . Awaiting Comments.

That disparity, the report warns, has national ramifications. While so much public and media attention goes to a small handful of elite institutions, “the largest majority of students are being served in institutions that spend on average, about $10,000 per student per year—no more than we spend for elementary and secondary education.” The report, “Trends in College Spending, 1999-2009,” paints a picture of higher education in the United States as an enterprise that is turning increasingly to tuition increases to fill financing gaps—a trend that fuels students’ and parents’ unease about the cost of higher education. “They see prices going up, and they don’t see the benefit” from those increases, says Jane V. Wellman, a co-author of the report. “And they’re right.”

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by Goldie Blumenstyk, The Chronicle of Higher Education.

Posted: September 14th, 2011, by: admin. Categories: . Awaiting Comments.

The University of California is a key economic catalyst for the state, generating $46.3 billion in annual economic activity for California and contributing $32.8 billion toward California’s gross state product through direct spending and multiplier effects, according to an independent economic impact report released today. Put another way, every $1 the California taxpayer invests in UC provides the foundational support that, supplemented by revenues from other sources, results in nearly $14 in overall economic output. The study by Economic & Planning Systems Inc. further shows that UC supports 1 in 46 jobs in California, uses state funding to leverage significant additional non-state revenue that benefits Californians and makes economic contributions to all regions of California through the economic ripple effects of its activities. The report did not measure the impact of UC’s development of human capital — additional benefits such as spinoff companies created from UC research, tax revenue generated by UC activities or the social and economic contributions of UC alumni.

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by Staff, UC Newsroom.

Posted: September 14th, 2011, by: admin. Categories: . Awaiting Comments.

The California Legislature has passed the second part of the California Dream Act of 2011, AB 131, which would allow undocumented, college-eligible immigrants to access public financial assistance for higher education. As it awaits the governor’s signature, it is worth reflecting on the constitutional design that underpins the idea that all willing students, even undocumented ones, deserve access to our nation’s educational system. The state’s Dream Act embodies and amplifies the basic principles enshrined in our Constitution, starting with the fundamental notion that our society does not visit the transgressions of parents upon their children. Our founding document: (1) ensures that descendants of traitors can still inherit property; (2) prohibits the conferral of titles of nobility; (3) grants citizenship to those born on U.S. territory, regardless of their parents’ legal status; and (4) prohibits denial of fundamental rights based on happenstances of birth, such as race, gender and wealth. Denying undocumented students access to higher education — and the funding necessary to facilitate that access — because their parents decided to bring them as children into the U.S. offends this central principle.

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by Pratheepan Gulasekaram, The San Jose Mercury News.

Posted: September 14th, 2011, by: admin. Categories: . Awaiting Comments.

Fed up with indecision and drift, the University of California is serving notice: Barring a miracle, tuition could nearly double over the next four years to more than $22,000. Don’t anyone miss the point: California’s finances and political priorities don’t favor higher education. That means the vaunted university system needs to fend for itself by asking students and their families to fill the gaps left by indifferent Sacramento… More revenue must be found, but there are too few ideas at hand. Sacramento is all about cuts, not strategic thinking, debate or leadership. Left on its own, the university has few options aside from taking it out on its faculty, staff and students. California will suffer unless a better way is devised.

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by The Editors, The San Francisco Chronicle.

Posted: September 14th, 2011, by: admin. Categories: . Awaiting Comments.

The recession is partly to blame. But the trends in California are long in the making. And if budget and performance problems are the new reality, rather than a temporary detour, they presage a very different California — one less educated, and therefore less innovative, less prosperous and less dynamic. Most critics and observers of California’s system remain focused on incremental and largely marginal improvements, but that’s not enough. If California is to retain its luster as an economic powerhouse, the state needs to think big: It needs to innovate and to re-imagine a higher education system that has barely changed in five decades. First, California’s political, educational and business leaders should set an ambitious goal that the state match or exceed the access and degree-production rates of the highest-achieving states or, better yet, international competitors… This means we must increase access to four-year schools. We must reverse the current trend of reduced enrollment in the Cal State system caused by massive budget cuts, faculty layoffs and reduced course offerings.

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by John Aubrey Douglass, The Los Angeles Times.

Posted: September 13th, 2011, by: admin. Categories: . Awaiting Comments.

The University of California will unveil its first top-tier cyber courses in January – 26 online offerings, from global climate change to game theory. At the same time, it’s eyeing China and even American soldiers as potential sources of cash to pay for them… the ability to educate large numbers of people cheaply via the Internet is stirring a national debate about its possibilities in an era of reduced public funding. One influential voice is Harvard’s Clayton Christensen, who argues in his new book, “The Innovative University: Changing the DNA of Higher Education,” that shifting to cyberspace can be a lifesaving business decision for campuses buried under rising costs. But to UC faculty who already question the wisdom of online instruction – how to prevent cheating is just one concern – the idea that it’s a cash cow is far-fetched. And the fact that UC is laying out millions of dollars after promising to tap outside sources is beyond irritating.

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by Nanette Asimov, The San Francisco Chronicle.

Posted: September 12th, 2011, by: admin. Categories: . Awaiting Comments.